My Father, The Dark Lord
by Lenore483
Summary: Hermione AU. How does one deal with having Voldemort as a father? You prank him, tell him he looks pretty in pink and make up ridiculous nicknames for him. You go to Ravenclaw even though you should be in Slytherin, you hex his followers and get them in trouble. A tiny part of you wishes he'd be proud of you, even though you are compassionate and kind, not a murdering Psychopath.
1. Daughter Dearest

**I know the few people that put me on follower alert were probably hoping for the Sirius/James/Hermione fic I mentioned in my last upload, but the story is impossible to publish chapter by chapter because of the amount of work I put into it, and how I go about it. (currently that story is at 86 chapters and 47 000 words)**

**I wanted to try out posting a story as I go, with a different angle to it than usual. I also saw the need for more fics with unusual pairings. There are no complete fics I could find with either Benjy Fenwick or Evan Rosier as a pairing for Hermione.**

**Also I find the idea of Voldemort as a father hilarious.**

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**Daughter Dearest**

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Voldemort had never spared much thought when it came to sex.

Then he had overheard some bints in the library talking about something only his Knights of Walpurgis should know about. Torturing his followers soon revealed the culprit.

When he exclaimed "It was just pillow talk!" Lord Voldemort stopped. He was curious about what this meant exactly, something his knights were willing to gush like teenage girls about. Especially when it meant he would pause dealing out 'Crucio's.

The Heir of Slytherin had a lot to think about. Maybe this would be a great source of information for him, Salazar knew his minions hadn't been up to the task lately. There had always been girls throwing themselves at him, willing to do anything to please him, and for the first time he took advantage.

It wasn't until his birthday in 59 that he realized the consequences of such a stupid action. One of the vapid girls he had taken advantage of to gain some information about a founders object had come around to surprise him. She thought the news that she was pregnant with his child was cause for celebration, but he had never been so enraged as then.

He wanted her to take an abortion, she wanted to get married. They started a huge fight in the middle of the party Malfoy had thrown for him, which was also the reason he didn't just perform the abortion on her right there. Hell he might have killed her. But there were too many pureblood witnesses he had no control over. And there was no way he could obliviate the lot.

So to his great resentment, they agreed she would have the baby, but there would be no marriage.

She hoped he would change his mind, but when her parents found out, and the Dark Lord showed no sympathy for her situation, they did damage was shipped out of the country for a year, to his great relief. When she returned with the half year old brown eyed little girl in March, her parents came to him.

They wanted the child to be taken care of, but did not want the shame of a kid out of wedlock brought to their family name. So they made a deal with Voldemort. He would take care of his baby, and would be paid a handsome amount of galleons to keep quiet, and have an account set up for the child, where they would pay child support to.

And so, at 33 years old, Voldemort was a single father. Obviously the little girl would not be named Lady Voldemort, a cute toddler was not something that struck fear in people. So she was eventually named Hermione Merope Riddle, her middle name coming from his mother because he had been weak like her.

Most people would have warmed up to such a sweet child like Hermione, but he was the Dark Lord, all he saw was a filthy brat that he was paid handsomely to keep around.

Most of the time she was taken care of by Death Eater wives that had children around the same age, and they all loved her. She would always take care of other people, a stark contrast to her father, and shared toys with other kids, to her father's great shame.

Her first word had been "Daddy" in front of his Death Eaters. They had tried hard not to snicker at the look on their Lord's face. He was outraged that someone would call him something so mundane, but at the same time slightly happy her first word was about him. When one of the Death Eater finally broke and giggled out loud, he was broken from his thoughts and crucioed the lot of them.

He had hoped that the child would be more like him, that it would strike fear in its peers, even from an early age. The little time he spent with her, he tried to make her hurt animals, or other kids, or even the House elf he had gotten from her mother's side of the family to make sure she was well taken care of.

But she had loved the little elf from the moment she laid eyes on it, and pampered it with tiny gifts she made and would try to help with its self inflicted wounds. No matter how hard Voldemort tried, she would not harm anything.

She grew up to be a stubborn child, preferring the company of books to the company of other children. She discovered that in this she could at least make her dad happy, he was more than willing to lend her his entire library.

Finally in 1971 she was allowed to attend Hogwarts. She was extremely excited to go to Diagon Alley and purchase her wand, and all the new books she would need. Somehow, she had managed to drag her father with her, to his complete horror he would at times enjoy her company.

She had also managed to drag him along to platform 9¾ for her departure to Hogwarts, and had left her grumpy old man with a hug before she ran into the train. The last thing she heard from him was that she better end up in Slytherin, and that she would not be allowed back home if she was a bloody Gryffindor.

She laughed and waved at him, completely unperturbed by the events.

When her name was called there were a few excited whispers at the Slytherin table. Apparently they had heard of her father, and seeing how Headmaster Dumbledore frowned, he had too. She sat down, with a wide smile on her face.

When the hat fell down over her eyes, the discussion began.

She was adamant that she should not be in Slytherin, and the hat was adamant that she should be. She set a record for hat stall, the hall growing restless when the girl seemed to be rooted to the spot. Finally the hat shouted "Ravenclaw!" to everyone's astonishment.

She caught a glimpse of Dumbledore's bewildered expression, and heard the disappointed murmurs from her father's house.

The next day she received her first Howler. She just quietly ate her toast while her father's voice loudly declared she was a disgrace to him, and that he never should have had her. He also demanded that she would return home over Christmas break.

But Hermione Riddle was not surprised, she had spent her childhood being reminded that nobody loved her, and nobody wanted her. Sure the Death Eaters would coddle her, and their wives would dress her up in pretty dresses and spend a lot of time with her. At the end of the day, she would return to her house, and find her father sneering at her. Sometimes she would tell him everything that happened that day, but soon discovered what a horrid idea that was.

Suddenly the goodwill they had towards her turned. They had been punished for not bringing her up to be a terrifying Death Eater like themselves.

So the letter was expected, the sneering from her fellow first years was not expected. Neither was the nasty comments from the older years.

She ran crying from the great hall, taking refuge in the second floor bathroom. At first she didn't notice that she was not the only one in there crying her eyes out. And so Hermione made her first friend at Hogwarts, Myrtle.

Dear Dad

I know how you feel about our family history.  
The Sorting Hat did want me to be sorted into Slytherin, I talked it out of it.

Today I made my first friend,  
a ghost named Myrtle,  
she said I reminded her of someone she went to school with.

H.M.R

She did not get a response from her father, but the next day she was met outside the Great Hall by Lucius Malfoy. "Miss Riddle?"

"Yes?"

He smirked at her "Your father wanted me to make sure you were settling in alright."

She narrowed her eyes suspiciously, since when did he involve himself so closely with her well being? "I'm fine thank you" she started to walk off to her first class, but was stopped by an arm on hers.

"It is my job as a Prefect to ensure the wellbeing of the students here, I hope you will allow me to escort you to your first class of the day."

She shook his hand off. "I'm fine, thank you." With an upturned nose she walked off, somehow managing to shake off the older boy on her way to class. She was not going to let her father control who her friends were, at least in this she would have control.

A couple of weeks into the school year she was invited to something called the Slug club. Curious to what exactly this was, she decided to go.

To her horror she knew almost everyone in the club already. It was mostly Slytherins she had grown up playing with, Death Eater children.

"Hermione Riddle! A pleasure to have you in our club, I am sure you will feel right at home." Professor Slughorn threw an arm around her shoulder and escorted her deeper into the room before she could turn tail and run. "As I'm sure you know, your father is in my club, he started back when he was at school."

Hermione gave a slight nod, her father had brought her up on every name to know, and Slughorn had made it on the list. But only as a means to get to know more important people, he was the sort of person that had value in who he knew, rather than who he was.

She scanned the room again and noticed she was the only first year to have made it. Everyone else seemed to be 4th years at least, maybe Slughorn picked them out when he knew their O.W.L. scores.

The following day she was instructed to continue going to the club by her father, and she decided that she would again go against her father's wishes.

When Christmas break finally came around, she received another letter telling her she would need to stay at Hogwarts after all. Her father had important business to attend to, and didn't want her to disturb his plans.

Hermione could feel herself smile, she would not need to see her father again before summer break, another half year of freedom felt wonderful.

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**Let me know what you think!**

**Would you have liked more interaction between Hermione and Voldemort as father/daughter? Did I gross over the first part of her life rather quickly, or not quick enough? Are you sad there is no sexy dangerous Rosier or sweet charming Fenwick yet?**

**Oh and for any Barty Crouch Jr fans, let me know how you want him to turn out. He is in Hermione's year, and he will want to get closer to the daughter of the man he admires so much at some point.**


	2. Presents

**Thanks to: EscapedMinds and AliceEnchanted for their reviews!**

**The time has slowed down a bit for this chapter I guess, and it's not the longest one but I felt inspired, wrote this and figured it was a good place to end it.**

**oh and the dollar signs $ means Parseltongue**

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**Presents**

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As usual Hermione's Christmas presents were pretty bleak.

Her father had sent her a letter telling her she better start making the right type of friends. He had also sent her a book on Dark Curses, which of course was cursed.

She sighed, at least he was predictable. She had sent him a couple of leashes, with a scathing letter saying he should have better control over his followers. She had also found a book on parseltongue that they didn't have in the library, but she was saving that for his Birthday. She would need to make amends somehow after her first gift.

His followers had sent her gifts this year as well. The wives sending her various clothes, all in green, and the Death Eaters had sent her jewelry or candy.

Her father had made it to be a huge event back in their house, and it seemed the better presents Hermione received, the more favor the Death Eater had with her dad.

Therefore, Hermione loathed presents, it was just a way of buying people. A way for people to get to her father.

She was surprised to receive one from Lucius Malfoy though. It seemed his father had drilled into him the significance Hermione could play in their lives.

Since she was 5 she had been aware of the battle the Death Eaters had between each other to procure a marriage contract between Hermione and their sons. It did not take long before it grew tiresome, and Hermione had taken steps to prevent them.

She had made it into her own little game. Whomever was the obvious front runner, would suddenly find themselves in trouble for something.

Sometimes she would break a vase or something expensive, right next to the Death Eater in question. They would then take the blame for it, knowing full well what would happen if they lay the blame on innocent little Miss Riddle.

Other times she would run away when they were assigned to watch her. And not return until she was sure they had been found out, or her father had come to find her.

Nobody dared touch a hair on her body, she knew that. Voldemort would not get the money he needed for his army if she was harmed.

The rest of the holiday passed rather quietly. She had found a nice corner of the Library that she vowed to keep for herself for the rest of her school years, and spent all her time there. The rest of the occupants were too busy enjoying the holidays to spend time in the library.

She had gotten another sad look from Dumbledore when she received the Howler for her present.

Hermione I would have thought you had learned better by now than to anger me.

These childish pranks will not be tolerated for long.

Get your act together.

$I would think the Heir of Slytherin to know better.$

$Stop acting like a Gryffindor$

From now on I expect you to keep better company.

Your Father

She watched the Howler disintegrate with little interest. Her father had been angry enough to retort to Parseltongue, it had been awhile since she had managed to get him that riled up. She smiled and collected the book she had been reading over breakfast before going back to the library.

Later that night she went up to the owlery to send her present. She had not penned the letter yet, so she sat down looking at the birds in contemplation. Should she try and make amends, at least a little bit, or should she throw more wood on the fire?

Eventually she decided on the middle ground.

Dear Dad

I hope this present is more to your liking.

Another year has gone by for the great Tom Riddle,

Do you feel older at all?

Love

Your Daughter

She could just picture the clenched teeth of her father as he read her letter. There was only one thing her father liked less than being called dad, and that was his given name. Sure she could get away with saying it, but there were sure to be a few Death Eaters cursing her name by the time the night was over. Her father did have quite the temper.

When school started up again she noticed eyes on her.

It had happened quite a lot, and she would always find Malfoy to be the one staring at her. She wondered if he had taken the mark already, or if maybe he had been given the task to look after her first.

If that was his road to success, he was sure going to fail.

She had years on escaping the senior death eaters clutches, little Malfoy was going to be easy to take care of.

She discovered how easy the first time she jinxed him, and was met with a 5 point deduction. She had just narrowed her eyes at him and said "Really?" before he started spluttering and gave her the points back. She had smiled her sweetest smile at him and skipped off.

But even with his fear of her, it seemed his fear of failure was bigger. He did not relent in his task, and she noticed that the prefect was always circling her when she was out of class.

If this was an example of his followers, there was no wonder her father didn't have any spies in the ministry. They wouldn't be able to steal a candy wrapper from a house elf.

One day she was sitting at her secluded spot, a Gryffindor asked to join her.

"My name is Lily Evans."

Hermione smiled brightly at her. She didn't know that last name, so it was clearly not someone related to Voldemorts merry band of fellows.

"Hermione Riddle." She answered.

They studied together for the rest of that day. And several other days Hermione would find Lily coming to join her.

After a while a gangly black haired kid joined the two. He was immensely curious about Hermione, being a Slytherin he knew a little about who she was.

The last name Snape was new to her as well, and one day she had to ask, out of curiosity, who they were.

"I mean, are you Mudbloods or Halfbloods?" when Lily started tearing up and ran off, and Snape chased after her, after sending Hermione a scathing look, she was lost. She noticed an older Gryffindor staring at her with disdain.

"What did I say wrong?" her voice was meek and subdued. These were the first friends she had made at Hogwarts, except that annoying ghost.

She had mostly been talking to herself, sure that no one would take the time to answer her. The boy searched her face for something "You called her a Mudblood."

"Yes?" she looked at him, and noticed that despite his scorn he was quite attractive. "Isn't that what it's called?"

"It means Dirty blood." Hermiones head rushed with thoughts, what exactly did that mean dirty blood? She came to the startling realization that essentially she had claimed that Lily was lesser than her. That since she hadn't inherited her magic she was a lesser witch than her, and Hermione was distraught.

"I never realized." A tear escaped her eye, how stupid could she have been? "I'm so sorry." She whispered to no one in particular.

The boys features softened a little "Why would you call her that then?"

She sighed "It's just the word my dad use, and his followers." She wiped the tear away.

"Followers? Don't you mean friends?" his eyes glinted, like he had caught a Ravenclaw slip up and say something stupid.

"No I meant followers."

They sat in silence for a bit "Your father isn't that nice is he?"

She bit her lip to stop from laughing "You could say that."

He smiled a brilliant smile at her, and she felt her breath catch. He was extremely handsome, his chiseled features looked like that of a Greek God. His bright green eyes seemed impossibly big.

"Thanks for not thinking I'm like him, like them." She nodded her head towards a group of Slytherin boys sitting nearby.

"You're welcome."

Before they could continue their conversation, the boy was accosted by a very pretty blond girl that plopped herself on his lap and proceeded to snog the living daylights out of him. Hermione felt herself blush, and she put her head down in her book to control it.

They left before she could ask the boy his name, probably to find a broom cupboard somewhere. Hermione realized she could probably not get Lily back after what she had done.

The next day she received a letter where her father praised her for ditching her friends the moment she realized they were Mudbloods. Hermione set the letter on fire right there at the Breakfast table, and didn't notice the curious glance of the boy she had talked to earlier.


	3. Numbers

**Super quick to update I know! (don't get too used to it) But getting reviews fuel my writing! (Seriously, AliceEnchanted writing that second review made me write ****_2 whole new chapters!_****) I could have posted yesterday, but I know how sporadic my writing can be so I figured I'd space them out more, but then I got a review from HazelEyedShadowhunter and I just had to post something!**

**And seriously 8 favorites and 12 follows? You witches and wizards make my day.**

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**Numbers**

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1 day of silence was all she asked, but it was not something she could be granted it seemed.

2 times she had suffered from the people supposedly protecting her. They had made her lose points from her house the first time, but the second time she had to endure 2 hours of detention with Slughorn.

Slughorn had spent the entire time beaming over her intelligence, and praising her father. She wanted to gag, what was with everyone telling her how charming he was? She had searched her mind to think of any moments her father had actually been charming, and came up empty.

It was taking a toll on her life, she preferred being left alone.

Lucius was bad enough, but now she had the 3 Slytherins of her own year that were following her around.

This made her days even worse, before she could at least escape Lucius when she was in class. But now a 3rd of the time, she had 3 sets of eyes following her in class. She was sad that she couldn't start hexing them in class for a long time yet. Apparently first years shouldn't know how to duel, she would have to wait at least a year before she was allowed to hex her classmates.

It didn't mean she wasn't going to hex them every time she could between classes. In fact most of her time outside of studying, was spent looking up new ways to torment the people following her, or actually hexing them.

She hadn't even bothered to learn their names. She was sure they had told her on multiple occasions, like telling her was going to earn them favor with the Dark Lord or their parents.

When her father had asked her if she was protected at school she had replied in the negative. Going on about how the castle seemed very scary when she had to walk around alone all the time. She knew it would make the boys even more persistent in their efforts, but it was worth it when she saw their looks as they got Howlers from their parents.

4 Howlers shouting at the Slytherin breakfast table at the same time was a right sight to behold. It had lifted her spirit immensely. Their house had abandoned them to the Howlers, while the rest of the school had laughed. The Gryffindors had spent the next few days quoting them, or throwing insults at the Slytherins in regards to the Howlers.

Hermione had seen the positive side of them following her around then. At least she was able to hear every witty thing the Gryffindors had come up with to torment them. And sometimes they were so embarrassed by the remarks that they escaped to their dungeon, leaving Hermione in peace to study. One day she had managed to get a whole 4 hours in the library alone.

It was stupid what had brought the entire thing on really.

4 Gryffindor boys had tried to prank her in some way. Their timing was really bad though, sending her flying down some stairs, and landing her in the hospital wing. She thought it was funny that the Matron was quick to fix her wounds and broken bones, but the dreadful green color of her skin had taken her 4 days to get out.

Thankfully Hermione didn't mind the color, and was allowed to attend classes in between trying to get the color out. She did wish they had turned her blue, or maybe given her a camouflage pattern, at least then she would be able to blend in more easily.

With the green color, she took to escaping into the Forbidden Forest. So far she hadn't been caught sneaking around, but her stalkers had been caught 5 times. She had watched from nearby as they tried to splutter out a reason for them going into the forest, again, when they had just been caught the previous day. They could not turn her in; their ego would be wounded if they admitted that she had outsmarted them again. Telling on the Dark Lord's daughter was not smart when you wanted to gain favor with him anyway.

After managing to get them banned from the library so she could study in peace, she noticed that they weren't the only ones keeping an eye on her.

The mysterious older Gryffindor would sneak glances at her. His eyes held humor and curiosity, he seemed open and welcoming.

It scared Hermione, why would someone look at her that way? It seemed like he had no intention of gaining favor from her for the Dark Lord. There wasn't anything to suggest he wanted to cause her harm, and he didn't have that glint in his eyes that suggested mischief.

After locking eyes with him for the 5th time, she sighed exasperated "What?"

He smiled at her "Nothing."

She narrowed her eyes at him, but decided not to pursue the matter, books were more important anyway. "Are you always this rude when someone takes an interest in you?" she looked up at him, there was good natured humor there, like he found her amusing.

"Depends on the person." He raised his eyebrows at that, she sighed "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to be rude." She smiled a genuine smile at him "Just some guys getting on my nerves."

"I've noticed." She hmm'd noncommittal at that and returned to her book.

"So where is your flock of followers now? Given them the day off?"

"Don't call them that. I don't have followers, I have stalkers." He laughed at her, and she stared at him, how strange.

"I thought girls wanted boys to give them the sort of attention you are receiving."

"What most girls want boys following them everywhere, watching their every move to report back to their father?" she raised her eyebrow at him.

"That's what it's about?"

"Apparently I need protection."

He laughed "From what I've seen, they should have someone protecting them from you. You throw some nasty hexes."

"Thank you."

"That wasn't a compliment."

They stared at each other for a while before Hermione noticed the time. "It's late, I need to get back to the dorms." She started gathering her things and made to leave.

"You don't have 5 minutes to spare for a conversation with me?" He seemed slightly disappointed by her sudden departure.

"Not really."

"How about I follow you back to your dorm and we talk?" he tried a charming smile, one she had seen her father use on his followers wives when he needed something. She cocked her head to the side, studying his face. She found that this boy did it better, but it had nothing on the brilliant smile he had when he thought something was funny.

"I don't think my stalkers would like that."

"I wasn't asking them, I am asking you."

She floated the books she had been using for her homework over to one of the carts and turned to face him. He had walked towards her, and was towering over her small form.

She studied his face, and found him even more handsome up close.

"No thank you, I can take care of myself."

Before he could say anything else, she turned on her heel and marched out of the library, pushing past him. To her relief he didn't follow her. But she did hear her stalkers take up pursuit once she left the library. She managed to shake them off when she jumped between the landings on the moving staircases.

The next morning 5 owls came floating through the windows at the same exact time, dropping one in front of her, one for Lucius Malfoy and one for each of the ones in her year. The instructions in it told her to stay away from the boy from the Bloodtraitor Fenwick line.

When she looked over to the Slytherin table she noticed the looks the boys were sending the Gryffindor table and her. She sighed; it seemed she would have a 5th person watching her. But this time one she couldn't interact with. unlike the Slytherin boys who she wouldn't want to interact with.

At least if she wanted to keep him safe, the boys would never do anything to harm Hermione, but the way they were looking at Fenwick she was sure they weren't above hurting him.

Hermione turned around to look at the boy and caught him winking at her. Now that he was forbidden territory he was much more interesting to her.

For the rest of the day she couldn't help but wonder what the green eyed boys first name was.

And she wondered if she would ever be able to have friends of her own, people her father didn't control.


	4. They Shoot Slytherin's, Don't They?

**So I am most likely going to update every weekend, unless I get sudden bouts of inspiration and can't help but post a chapter straight away.**

**Very little Evan Rosier action yet, sadly she doesn't really bother noticing the guy until her 2nd year. However the holiday is here for Hermione, meaning a lot of interaction with the Dark Lord.**

**As always thanks to everyone who clicked favorite and follow on this story, and a special thanks to AliceEnchanted, my ever faithful reviewer who gives me the most amazing ideas. If you do like she does, and tell me what you like/dislike, or would like to see in this story, it will most likely show up in an upcoming chapter. **

**Enjoy xxx**

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**They Shoot Slytherin's Don't They?**

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The rest of the school year passed with little incident.

Well little for someone like Hermione.

It had spread through Slytherin that she was to be looked after, something the other houses seemed to frown upon.

The few Ravenclaw acquaintances she had started to shun her because they didn't like the way the Slytherins were looking at them. They had told her on multiple occasions that she should just transfer into Slytherin already.

The Slytherin girls were not happy with this development, they thought that Hermione was some sort of a harlot sleeping with all the boys.

She was 12, spent her entire time in the library, and refused to talk to any of the boys, preferring to hex them. She couldn't fathom the logic behind what the girls were saying. Even though it should have been clear after a while that Hermione had no interest in "their boys" as they had called them, they continued to harass her.

They only whispered insults at her when they could, they did not dare say too much in front of her protectors, or as she liked to think of them, stalkers.

Fenwick had tried on some occasions to talk to her, but his girlfriend had stopped him from doing so many times. That was if he wasn't met with a wall of Slytherins circling Hermione.

She thought they were being ridiculous with their actions, but she had managed to escape getting any more letters from her father by allowing them to protect her. She still made their lives a living hell by telling her father of the dangers of the castle she had to face alone. Or hexing them, avoiding them, or running away from them.

So her only friends at the end of 1st year was a ghost and her books, she was really sick of it.

Her father was not in for a pleasant summer.

On the Hogwarts express she was forced to allow the 3 Slytherin boys of her year to sit with her. The two other Slytherin boys of that year didn't have the incessant need to bother her like these three. She only remembered one of the other boys in that year, and Severus Snape had his own girl to drool after. Not that any of the Slytherins surrounding her ever drooled, thank Merlin.

When she arrived at the platform she was met with her father who asked her if she had a pleasant trip.

"It was a bit lonely." She answered, knowing the three boys were able to hear her.

She noticed that a few of the other moms that were picking up their kids, stood nearby fawning over her father. If it hadn't been for the crowd, they would have probably already assaulted him.

His eyes narrowed "What do you mean?"

"Well I sat all alone in the compartment the entire trip."

"I just saw Rosier, Mulciber and Avery following you out now." Ah so that was their names, she would most likely forget their names again pretty soon though.

"Yeah they joined me just before I got off the train."

His gaze flickered behind her, and she could feel the fear emanating from the boys in question. Hopefully they would be punished by their parents and not her dear old pap.

"Dad can we go home now? I'm tired from carrying my bags around, I wasn't allowed to use magic to levitate them." She saw his eyes narrow by her use of 'Dad' and turn angry when he heard that she had to carry her bags. She could have probably let the boys carry them for her, but she had bolted before they had a chance to offer, it wasn't really their fault.

She couldn't help how much she liked getting Slytherin's and Death Eaters in trouble. The only thing that rivaled how much fun it could be was getting her dad mad. Nothing made her happier than combining the two, and honestly they were making it rather easy for her.

Suddenly she heard a pop next to her, and her favorite creature in the world stood next to her.

"Noddy!" she exclaimed with a smile, hugging the little house elf. Uh oh, by the look on her dad's face she was in trouble now. He had never condoned her affections for her little house elf, he wanted her to torture the poor creature, not hug it. Her best friend took her bags quickly, and with a pop had gone back to the house to extract everything from her bags.

"Come on Daughter of mine, I wouldn't want more shame to be brought on my name by staying here and letting this little tirade continue." She hated it when he called her childish. Maybe some of her actions were, but that was the only way she knew how to get attention from him. However, being nice to Noddy was not something she did to spite him; she did it because it was the only being in the world that kept her company. The only one that seemed to see her as something other than a ticket to her father's good graces, and she loved Noddy for it.

"Fine Dad." They stared at each other in anger for a while, the surrounding Death Eaters and children scared to move to attract either Riddle's attention.

"Have a nice summer!" was shouted across the crowd, and it broke the silence and uncomfortable tension. She turned to see where the noise had come from, and saw Fenwick with a huge smile waving at her. She couldn't help but blush and give a small wave back, ignoring her father who was about to blow up from repressed anger.

Hermione looked up at Voldemort, rolled her eyes, and walked through the barrier keeping platform 9 ¾ separated from the muggle world.

He might have been able to punish or admonish her when he was surrounded by his followers, but he couldn't afford to do anything against her in front of hundreds of muggles. The ministry could only look away and ignore what he did for so long before they had to take action. Pulling out a wand and hexing your daughter in front of a crowd was not something that could be ignored. Hopefully he would calm down by the time they got home.


	5. Bodyguard

**UGH so this chapter was such a pain, I think it's because there is no Benjy or Evan, and very little Voldy. But it sets up the next three chapters, meaning the rest of the summer so it is very important. Sorry for being so late with this update, just had a hard time writing it, and then real life happened -.- **

**To make up for it, expect the next two chapters up very soon (I actually wrote most of them before I even started on this.) Since they are so closely linked I will post the next two close together.**

**As always thanks to the lovely AliceEnchanted who reviewed again (you are awesome) and to the lovely magical people who clicked favorite or started following the story!**

**(A bit darker this one, but hope you still enjoy it)**

**Xx**

* * *

**Bodyguard**

* * *

"This here is Mulciber." The man nodded at Hermione, before he continued staring off into the distance. "He will protect you when you leave the house."

The man was as big as a house, and as broad as an ox. His muscles were bulging out of his too small shirt, and he had an air about him that screamed you should stay away from him. From what little she knew about Mulciber from before, he was the guy her dad sent out when somebody should be taken out. But he wasn't the silent deadly assassin type that you would have a hard time picking out, no he was the guy that intimidated people into keeping his actions silent. The guy being killed was usually not alone, and the few surviving witnesses often had a lot of bruises. He was the one guy that could resort to such muggle methods without Voldemort raising an eyebrow in question at his actions.

"Protect me?" she raised an eyebrow at her dad. "Who exactly is it you are protecting me from?"

"People that wish you harm."

"You couldn't narrow that down a bit?"

"No." staring into his eyes she saw that there would be no way around this.

She sighed "Fine." Apparently she had managed to please to old sack of potatoes, because Voldemort smiled at her. If that grimace and pull of facial muscles could be called a smile.

"Good, now I have business to attend to." Then he took off, and Hermione was left with the wall of bricks that would now be her Bodyguard.

She tilted her head, running through every possible thing she could do to make this man want to quit. There was a reason the only one left wanting to baby sit her as a kid was the house-elf Noddy.

Bodyguard was just another fancy way of saying baby sitter in Hermione's opinion.

Over the course of the next few weeks Hermione continued to evade her "Bodyguard" every chance she got.

She saw very little of her father, and the only company was this annoying man, and her friendless state meant there was no company to find there either. Looking down at her books she realized that they were her only friends, but unlike most people in that situation, she was happy with it.

In her heart she realized that this man cut out of stone being the only company for her summer was killing her. Before she could at least be in the presence of others when her fathers had his "Gatherings" but this summer he kept her from them, and the people involved from her. Even her poor little house elf Noddy was kept away.

With all of this happening, or not happening depending on how you look on it, she wanted out. A summer with nothing but books was better than a summer spent with a Gollum for a bodyguard.

Her plans and schemes got crazier than ever before, but she could not find a way to get rid of him. Every time she thought success was imminent, she turned a corner and there was his depressing sight.

By the time summer was midway through, she had given up hope of getting a peaceful summer alone.

As any old week, she went to the bookstore in Diagon Alley to pick up a couple of new books since she had run out. Walking into the familiar store and closing her eyes to flood her sense of smell with the peace that books emanated, she did not notice how crowded it was.

But opening her eyes, and for once paying attention, she was overwhelmed with the crowd in the store.

Glancing around, she mostly just caught the sight of adult's shoulders pressing against each other, fighting to get closer to the front. The explanation for the commotion evaded her until her brooding bodyguard showed her to the side of the crowd. Violently she crashed with a poster proclaiming that up and coming author "Gilderoy Lockhart" was doing a book signing.

Searching her memory for any recollection of his books, she almost missed Mister Serious disappearing with the crowd. He had done a great job of keeping her away from the mayhem, but had failed in doing so for himself.

When Hermione turned around to go look for books in a less crowded section she noticed the absence of his presence.

It brought her more comfort than the smell of books.

She grinned to herself, seeing his head scanning the crowd for signs of her. Just before he could lock down her location, Hermione ducked down, and moved out of the store.

Hitting the streets at a dead run, she didn't stop until she was down a gloomy dark alley. There she hugged the stone bricks on a shop, hiding in the shadows from her would be pursuer. With baited breath she listened carefully for any signs of him, but could only hear her heart hammering in her chest.

When she was sure he had lost her, she let out a giggle of relief.

"Who's there?"

There was something ominous about that voice, so she quickly took off in the opposite direction of it, deeper into the dark.

She had been here before, never really alone, but the times her father had no choice but to drag her along for the day. She looked around curiously, wondering if there was anything worth buying, or a store worth browsing.

She continued for hours, just evading people, and looking through glasses. Until finally she knew she had to find her bodyguard again.

Turning on her heel, she made quick work of navigating the narrow streets to find her way back into the lighter areas where he was probably looking for her.

"Tasty." A drawl came from behind her, she spun around, trying to locate the source.

"Mmm." A leer came from another direction, from another voice.

"Let's have a bite." A high pitched abnormal voice said, making chills run down her spine.

Suddenly she was grabbed around the middle, and she fought hard against the man. He smelled vile, and seemed malnourished from the lack of fat on his body, and the bones of his sternum pressing into her back. "Let me go!" She hit everywhere she could reach, struggling against his grip.

One of the other men came out of the shadows, Hermione could make out a haggard face with matted hair plastered to it. His bony hands reached up and grabbed her chin, forcing her head up while she started struggling against him too. By their bony appearance, you would not think two men like these possessed the strength they used against her.

"Pretty little rich girl lost?"

"My dad will kill you when I tell him what you did to me."

"Just have to shut you up then." The high pitched terrifying voice said.

Suddenly a blade hit her underneath where the first man's arms were pressing against her, she felt a sharp pain in her abdomen, followed by another cut, and another and another. She coughed up blood, and heard the laughter and cruel words of the men harming her.

With a final scream she used up the rest of her energy, and blacked out.

The darkness was welcoming.


	6. Noddy

**I might be the a horribly sporadic updater, I plan to post something every week but then sometimes I can't help myself and just have to post when I finished a chapter. I was actually not in the mood for writing on this one, but a continuation of the Hermione/James/Sirius oneshot I have already posted (And I just can't look) but then that just ended up being scrambled and not at all like my muse have been bugging me to write it. So I decided to fix up this chapter, and ended up finishing it YAY! and it ended up being a much better chapter then I had thought it would be.**

**Thanks to AliceEnchanted and HazelEyedShadowHunter for the wonderful reviews, and everyone who has faved or started following, you are awesome! (Seriously 16 favs and 36 followers? *Blushes* you non muggles are the best)**

* * *

**Noddy**

* * *

She woke up in her bed, groggy and hurting. She couldn't remember anything, but by the rumbling of her stomach she had been asleep for a long while.

"Mistress is awake!" she heard Noddy squeak of pleasure and the pop that signaled his arrival.

She groaned, and put the pillow over her head, the light, the noise everything was just too much for her right now.

When she curled up to hide deeper under her covers, she felt the pain in her stomach. Her stomach lurched from the sudden movement, and she barely managed to scramble to the edge of the bed to throw up on the floor. What little was in her stomach was quickly emptied, and she was dry heaving and gasping for air between convulsions by the time she heard footsteps approaching.

The door slammed open with a powerful bang while she tried to straighten herself up, but only succeeded in falling back against the pillows.

"What were you thinking?!" Voldemort screamed at her.

She groaned "Too much noise."

"Running off like that, there was a reason I gave you a bodyguard!" who knew her father's voice could go that high? That was not the manly voice of a Dark Lord, that was the sound of a man in desperate need of an anger management course, and possibly one to deal with stress.

"I'm sorry I almost lost you your golden ticket." She mumbled in annoyance. Couldn't he just leave her alone? It wasn't like she had the strength to do anything to annoy him at the moment, she could barely get the strength to fix her pillows let alone try another stunt.

"Have you no regard for your own safety?!" he was pacing, and huffing, had she not been in so much pain the sight might have amused her.

"I don't have to! You make sure that there is nothing in this world that can ever get near enough to hurt me!" the screaming tore at her throat, she desperately needed some water, but was afraid she'd just throw it straight up again.

"BECAUSE YOU ALWAYS TRY TO GET YOURSELF HURT!"

"I'm just trying to live my LIFE dad, or did you forget I am actually A HUMAN BEING! I'm not just the golden egg that you keep locked up for its protection!"

"Well there is an idea!" he smiled cruelly at her "From now on you will stay here, no leaving the house, and then at the end of the summer we will see if maybe I will let you go back to Hogwarts."

She gaped at him "You can't!"

"Watch me missy."

"I won't tolerate it, I will owl mom and tell her about this and then you won't get any more of her money!"

Voldemort stormed up to her, pointing his finger in her face. "Don't threaten ME! I AM THE DARK LORD!"

"What else can you do to me? I'M NOT AFRAID OF YOU!" she glared back at him, and for a moment, all that could be heard was the puffing of breath coming from both of them as they dared the other to look away and lose. The air crackled around them with angry magic as the moment continued, then her father broke it.

He gave her a half smile, a smirk worthy of a Malfoy "Just for that, I am banning you from the library as well, no books." His voice was eerily calm, and very frightening, sending shivers down Hermione's spine. "One of the elves will be along to collect whatever books you have in your room."

"No please don't-" he put up a hand to silence her.

"It is already done." He straightened up, and moved towards the door. Right before he passed out into the hallway he turned "I am going away for business, when I get back we will discuss the possibility of getting your books back."

"Dad!" but he had already shut the door tightly, leaving Hermione to angrily wipe away the tears that had spilled down her cheeks.

She was left with no one for company but Noddy.

It was her own fault, she knew that, but that didn't mean she was pleased with it.

Voldemort had put up special wards that would knock her unconscious if she tried entering the library, or even thought about taking down the wards separating her from her beloved books.

Noddy couldn't help her.

When she was a kid she had managed to free the little house-elf too many times. She had given him clothes to make him look cute, or play dress up, or because she thought he looked cold, and thereby freed him. Voldemort then had to figure out a way to bind Noddy to them again, apparently binding a house elf was not as easy as people believed. Everyone had lost count by the time Voldemort finally had enough and found a way to bound the little creature only to him. This also meant that the creature could only follow Hermione's orders when they correlated with the Dark Lord's orders.

So she was stuck with a friend who had been told not to engage with her other than for food, and a house empty of people, and the library locked away from her.

She had been furious with her dad before the start of Summer, but now she was downright vindictive.

It took a while of potions and bandages and healers before she was allowed to leave the bed, and even then she had to take it careful until the wounds settled.

The first few days after she was better, she had held out, vowing to not let her father get the best of her.

The week after, she had taken to destroying everything in the house she could get her hands on. Noddy just fixed everything after she had done so. Sometimes she hadn't even been able to finish destroying a room before it was put back together again.

Then she had tried every possible way of contacting her father too make things right, and be allowed to touch her books, or go outside. She had even gone as far as harassing her poor house elf to get her just one book, or just one day outside.

When none of that worked, she moped around for a few days, not bothering to eat, and sleeping way too much.

Finally she was sick of it all, and figured if she couldn't read, she would just have to find another way of distracting herself.

With careful planning she had managed to convince Noddy that she was fine and didn't need looking after.

Maybe it was wrong of her to lull the thing into a false sense of security, but she knew Noddy was not the one that was going to be taking the brunt of her dad's anger in the end. No the little thing was protected against that, something about the way he had bonded the house elf only to him, also meant he could not do it harm.

That didn't stop Noddy from punishing himself, quite to opposite.

After she waited a couple of days, making sure the House elf had been convinced of her angelic tendencies, she started to plan.

She had spent hours pouring over parchments with her quill, figuring out where to put everything, and how she should go about it. Overall it didn't take as long as she suspected, now setting everything up to coincide with how her Dad would move about the house, that had taken a great deal of time.

The grand entrance to the house was something inspired by the way Egyptians used to open doors back in the day, with quite a different end result.

Once inside the grand entrance, she had planned something that would have him boiling in rage enough to make anyone stupid enough to come back with him, disappear in a flash. Which she needed for the next part of her plan.

He would of course move up the stairs to get to her, and she had set up a ward that would react only to him, something that could be ruined if someone were to come with him. She wondered how long it would take him to take it down, and if he had enough brain power underneath all his rage to think of a way around it instead.

The second set of wards keyed to him would only come when he would think she was done with him, and it would set him on a completely different path than the direct route he had planned.

There she had a Slytherin surprise that was very much inspired by her Ravenclaw dorm, something that could take a minute, or hours to get around.

Of course all of this could be avoided if he decided to take down the wards keeping Hermione from the library, they were keyed to fall if that one did.

After all her careful planning, and ages spent setting it up whilst bypassing Noddy, all she had to do was wait.


	7. Home Alone

**Ugh this chapter was such a pain! Took me so much longer than I planned, and I had all these ideas that I felt like weren't coming across well enough. So finally I just gave in, wrote the thing and am now posting it. Don't blame me for any of the spelling mistakes, I can't be bothered fixing it before updating. But if you find any that bothers you, please leave a review and I will fix it.**

**In other news, I finally have an idea for where this is headed. Enough that I have written a 1 000 word epilogue! But we are only coming up to second year in a couple of chapters, so who knows if that will change!? (so much for my promise to myself to not write anything further into the story than following the timeline)**

**thanks again to all the wonderful reviews from , L****K-HoGwArTs-hEaDgIrL and the amazing A****liceEnchanted! Your reviews made me smile! And thanks to everyone who has favorited and or started following this story, you are wonderful! **

**PS: can you tell I've been procrastinating writing this by reading Poe, Lawrence and Shakespeare?**

* * *

**Home Alone**

* * *

She felt the breeze of the wards surrounding the house.

Her dad was home at last.

Showtime.

She was giddy with anticipation, and felt her entire body flood with adrenaline.

Her place by the window enabled her to see the entire walk from the front gates, and up to the house. With every step Voldemort took closer, she could hear her heart thumping against her ribcage.

Voldemort was not pleased with how his little trip had gone. He could feel his angry magic bristling around him. All he wanted to do, was get inside and relax with one of his books, maybe curse a follower or two.

He stormed down the pathway to the house, grumbling under his breath, setting fire to a few rose bushes along the way. The gravel beneath his feet seemed angry with the force of his steps, his breath was sharp, steady and fast. His robes were billowing behind him, making him seem like an angry stormy cloud descending on the Riddle house.

He exhaled in relief when he finally hit the steps leading up to the house. He pushed against the door with greater force than he normally would, not noticing that they lagged a bit and dragged more than usually.

He heard something clicking and ticking, something that should have alerted him that everything was amiss. He caught it all a second too late, his eyebrows raising comically as he saw the huge trunk of wood falling towards him out of nowhere.

He was caught in that moment of utter panic, where you have 5 different scenarios playing in your mind and not being able to decide which one to act upon. Hermione had reached the top of the stairs just in time to see him standing like a deer caught in the headlights and raise his eyebrows at the tree trunk swooping in from above.

He let out a loud "OMPFH!" sound as it connected with his chest, Hermione wincing at the odd crunching sound it made after having connected with, and broken his rib cage. She saw his weirdly graceful arched path through the air as the force from the wood was transferred from it to him, sending him flying over the steps and back on the gravel.

He groaned, and Hermione stifled a laugh.

Some muttering and huffing and puffing later, and Voldemort had fixed his broken bones somewhat and walked up into their foyer again. This time she could almost see the anger radiating from him in waves.

"HERMIONE MEROPE RIDDLE YOU ARE IN SO MUCH TROUBLE!"

She eeped and ran down the hallway to get away from him, escaping to her bedroom and locking herself behind it. Just as she twisted the lock, she heard the garbage hitting him, and his scream of rage following it.

As he started up the stairs she held her head close to the door, hoping to hear exactly what his reaction would be when- a loud eeep filled the house, and followed by a rushing sound. He had found out what happened to the stairs, just like the girl dorms in the Ravenclaw house. The loud clatter meant that she had calculated right, and he had ended up in the garbage pile once more.

It took him a while to figure out how to work around the charm, she waited with baited breath as he had come up the stairs and rounded the corner. She could just about see his rigid posture as he walked down the hallway, all the way over to the chute she had installed.

His face when he stepped forward and there was nothing underneath him was priceless. She only wished she had a camera to capture the moment. A laugh escaped her as he screamed bloody murder sliding down the tunnels.

She had made sure they were extremely long and arduous if not impossible to get back up.

The bottom of the chute was where he kept his poisonous snakes, the literal snake pit in the house. Someone had forgotten to feed them while he was gone, completely by accident of course, and they were on the warpath.

Voldemort was the only guy who was sure to survive something like that, so she wasn't worried about his safety, more hers when he found the door and saw the password, or more like the riddle that would unlock the door.

She was surprised and apprehensive about how quickly he solved "What can you rearrange Tom Marvolo Riddle to become?" not only was it not "I am Lord Voldemort", you also needed to be a parselmouth to get out.

How many people knew "Mr Tom, a Dildo Lover" in Parseltongue?

When he got out of that room, he would be met with hallway upon hallway filled with plastic cups. Stepping on them would result in a big splash, lifting them up would make water spill all over. Well most of them were water, some were different kinds of potions she had brewed over the summer. She wasn't sure if any of them were going to react badly to each other.

She really hoped they wouldn't. Pranking her dead was suicidal, yes, but she was the proverbial money maker, and he could reign in his temper for that. But if she seriously maimed him in her poor pranking siege against her dad, she wasn't sure he would.

He was storming down the hallway up to her room now, and she was sure the crowning on the cake was going to kill him, or maybe her.

When he walked into her room, the bucket on top of her door tipped over, spilling its contents all over him.

It was just swamp water, but it really made you itch.

"Hey dad." She chirped happily, pretending to read a book she had managed to steal.

She looked up and swore he was actually steaming with rage, smoke coming out from all orifices, and the man turning an ugly shade of red.

Suddenly his wand was out, and he started setting fire and blasting everything in his sight. Hermione ducked behind her bed to take cover, putting up a shield to take the debris that might come her way.

It took her dad an hour before he stopped setting fire or exploding things in the house, the House Elves running around trying to fix everything straight after he was done destroying it. But the house still looked like a tornado, storm and a fire had taken hold of it, before an earthquake had finished the job.

Hopefully the elves would find a way to fix most of it, because there was a huge chance she wasn't going to be able to live there for a while seeing as barely anything was left of it.

Her dad had left again before he had spoken to her, probably because he would murder her if he tried talking to her before he had calmed down.

Hermione was sure glad she wasn't a Death Eater at that moment.


	8. Bucktoothed Duckling

**Yay Early update! Shorter than usual though, but anyone that gets the references in the chapter title and one of the dialogues will get a virtual cookie and some other price I havent thought of yet.**

**The idea for my previous chapter came from something AliceEnchanted wrote to me in a PM, the simple line "Hermione pranking her dad" made me think of all the wonderful pranks she could pull. I promise there are more pranks to come, and *fingers crossed* they will be more diabolical as she gets older as well!**

**I feel super bad about not thanking the wonderful reviewers I have gotten with my previous chapter, did update and fix it when I realized, but I just wanted to say again; I am so thankful for all of the wonderful reviews and the response this fic has gotten! 50 followers is insane in my book, this is my first lenghty fic and the pairing isn't only rare, it is non existent on this site so thank you!**

**xx**

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**Bucktoothed Duckling**

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"The Rosiers?!" Hermione shouted loud enough to be heard throughout the house.

"After what you just pulled, you should be glad he didn't send you to the dungeons until the semester starts up."

"Well he knows he can't do that, it would mean no more money for him."

"That may be, but it doesn't change the fact that he-"

"I'm not going."

Yaxley sighed, why had he agreed to do this again? This little brat was never going to listen to anything he said. It was more use talking to a wall.

Oh yeah he had come late for the meeting,

That was last minute,

Because he was doing the Dark Lords bidding.

Oh and the whole thing about the Dark Lord torturing you or killing you if his orders were questioned, that played a part as well.

At least he hadn't been as late as Rosier, who had stumbled in seconds after himself. The man had been seen as the perfect candidate to take care of the spoiled thing for the rest of the summer.

If nothing else, Voldemorts decision would ensure no Death Eater ever came late again, because Hermione duty was worse than his Crucio. Mostly because she was a spoiled brat, and when you eventually failed in taking care of her, it resulted in multiple Crucio's.

"This is pointless." He exclaimed, making Hermione smile smugly at him.

"Please tell my father that it is."

"No I meant-" she raised an eyebrow, and Yaxley counted to ten on the inside, trying to calm himself. It would not do to kill the Dark Lord golden goose, no matter how foul it seemed.

"You will be sent by portkey in an hour, if you aren't packed by then, you are going without your things."

Hermione turned a nasty shade in rage, but before she could send a hex his way, Yaxley had escaped out the door. She sent a reducto at the door for good measure. It wasn't like the rest of the house was in any better shape.

Seeing no other option available, she started packing.

The house she lived in might be splendid compared to other wizards. But by the looks of the Rosier residence, they were royalty. It could only be described as a castle, and part of Hermione perked up at the idea.

Many of her books detailed the types of secret passages and secrets hidden within castles like this one, and for once in her life, she wanted to do something other than read.

"So happy you could come." Hermione's eyes narrowed in on one of the annoying prats that had been following her around all year. She could tell by the way he ground his teeth that he did not mean what he said.

"So happy to be here." She answered in a way that left no question of her being just as she had been all year long.

Suddenly she felt her wand leave the comfort of her pocket, and that safety that surrounded her when she had it with her disappeared.

"You will get it back at the end of summer."

"Dad don't you-" but before she could finish what she was going to say, he had apparated back home. She grumbled and turned back to the Rosiers, their son was wearing a smug smile, it was clear he was going to return the favor.

"So lovely to have you here Miss Riddle."

"Lovely to be here Lady Rosier, but please, call me Hermione."

"Respectable young ladies get addressed by their last name."Lady Rosier said with an upturned nose. Oh no she was one of those. Part of her wished she had paid more attention to how each of the death eaters and their wives acted so she could have known this beforehand. On the other hand, it wouldn't have changed the way this woman acted. Or the fact that she was stuck here for the rest of the summer without a wand, she sighed, at least she had her books back.

She looked up at the Death Eater, the man of the house. She wondered if he might have a fancy title of some sort "Lord Rosier." She curtsied respectfully, but the man didn't even look her way. Was that the wrong title, or was the man just a jerk?

There was an awkward silence, and Hermione shifted nervously, trying to figure out how to best go about this situation. Because of her father's overprotective nature, she rarely had the opportunity to engage with other people, especially ones of stature in a setting where she was to respect them.

Whenever a wizard or Witch was at her house, they knew better than to talk to the Dark Lord's daughter, it might very well get you killed. They would only speak to her if they were directly ordered to do so.

"I have business to attend to." Lord Rosier said to his wife, and still not looking at Hermione, he gave a warning glance and nod to his son before he disappeared down the path leading to the house. Looking over at the son of the house, she could see him frowning, and by his scornful glance her way she realized he had been warned about her in some capacity.

Well, this was going to be a wonderful summer, after all, who didn't want to be exiled to a family that hated you while you were unable to use magic?


	9. Quiet Before the Storm

**I've noticed that this story has deep ties to my childhood. For some reason I draw inspiration from the movies, tv shows and books I read as a child. That in itself is not too bad, but somehow with this chapter I tapped into the darker parts of my childhood. **

**Now I've only been bullied at school so my story is much lighter than some you come across, especially online. Nevertheless I wanted to give a fair warning that this story has taken a darker turn now and might continue to go in that direction. So if you do not want to continue reading this story that contains bullying and violence, just remember, I gave it an M rating to warn of some people, and it is never to late to stop reading.**

**Thanks to everyone for the wonderful reviews (I'm looking at you; ShadowPrincess1621 and AliceEnchanted!) and everyone who started following or favorited the story, I just officially hit 50 followers in this story and decided to celebrate by giving you all a new chapter!**

**enjoy! Xx**

* * *

**Quiet Before the Storm**

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Her bedroom was a dream, the castle was surreal and Hermione was a ghost.

That's what she felt like at least, they would ignore her the entire day, except when she walked outside, then she was stalked by the son of the house, watching over her. Then at dinner time they would gather around the table, Hermione being ignored completely, and the son of the house only engaged in polite conversation. Apparently the adults were deemed to be in a much higher standing than the two teenagers.

Sometimes she would hear other voices, all three of them having visitors. Hermione felt more lonely here in a house that always seemed to be filled with voices of strangers. At least back home she had Noddy who would keep her company somewhat, the house elves here were never even seen.

It was a lot like Hogwarts in that regard, but somehow being shut out so completely made her desperately want to be included. She wanted that closeness and company that the other had so willingly.

It took her a while to find the bedroom of her peer, the one she still hadn't learned the name of.

She stood in the doorway, finding him in the company of two other vaguely familiar faces. None of them seemed to notice her presence, she tried clearing her throat, but only got a high laugh and an eye roll that she missed.

"Hey."

The son grumbled and turned around "What do you want?"

She shifted nervously "I uh-" what exactly did she want? "I was wondering if I could join you?"

One of the other guys scoffed.

"Now the Ice Princess wants company?" the son answered.

The lanky one started twirling his wand in his fingers. "Who would have thought?"

All three of them sniggered at her, and returned to ignoring her. She crossed her arms over her chest and leaned against the door, trying to think of what to do now. They clearly didn't want her around, but she wasn't going back to her room and hearing the echo of voices fill the silence of her loneliness without having given the other option a serious go.

"What are you guys doing?" she tried.

"Ignoring you." The broad shouldered ugly one answered. The other two laughed, the son giving him a congratulatory clap on his back.

"Why?"

"Doesn't feel so great when it's you on the receiving end does it?" The son looked up at her and she noticed his bright blue eyes, and how cold they became when they landed on her. It seemed like they had just been filled with laughter and mischief, but she had taken that from them, from him.

"You ignore us all year and now you're suddenly all chummy?" the lanky one asked.

"I didn't-"

"You did." The son said, and their eyes met in a silent battle, the other two afraid to break it lest she win. Hermione finally knew what they were talking about, these were here three main body guards. The ones she would hex and curse and avoid, these boys that were supposed to take care of her, even though they only wanted to be boys and have fun.

"It's summer now, we have time off from following the spawn of Hell around." Lanky guy said, his eyes glinting dangerously.

"Why don't we do to her what she did to us?" Shoulders said.

"I like the way you think Mulciber." The son said, and with that they all rose and started walking towards her. She gulped and some deep primal instinct in her was triggered when she saw the faces of the three boys before her. Her heart was hammering in her chest, her palms were slick, and her only thought was 'run'.

When they were about 5 meters away from her, she turned and ran down the hallway. She wanted to wring her clothes off to let her chest stop constricting around her, to cage her in and make her gasp for breath as the boys laughed and took after her.

Come on Hermione, you have avoided them on numerous occasions, times when your safety wasn't on the line.

But they had the home field advantage, and they used it as she soon discovered when one of the boys suddenly sprang out in front of her from a secret passageway and blocked her escape.

She shrieked loudly, trying to turn around, but found the two others behind her, caging her in. She started backing up, walking until her back hit the wall, and the boys were in front of her.

"BO!" lanky, the guy that had popped up in front of her said, and she turned towards him, and Shoulders grabbed her arms and twisted them behind her. She was struggling to breath, this was too much like the guys in the alley, the ones that wanted to kill her.

Her thoughts were so far gone she never noticed what the boys said, she only knew they fell silent when she shrieked "LET ME GO!" and tears started falling down her cheeks.

They laughed at her again "What's the matter Princess? I thought you wanted to play with us?" The Son was standing in front of her, while Lanky was to his side, eying her in a disgusting way.

She tried to calm down, but it was getting harder to breathe, all she could do was think about the older guys in the dark alley, and that there would be no bodyguard around to rescue her. These three boys before her were the ones that were supposed to be looking after her, and here they stood laughing at her misery.

"Let's play." Lanky said as he ran his wand down her throat, she turned away, trying to think of everything but the wand, and what could possibly happen to her.

"Petrificus totalus!" was all he said, and she was both relieved that nothing more had happened, and apprehensive about what could possibly happen next.

"Let's put her in there." Shoulders said, pointing to the secret passageway.

"Good idea." Sonny boy said, and they all dragged her frozen body into the dark secret in the wall, Hermione panicking even more. The last thing she saw before she was left to a cold and drafty corridor in a deserted part of the castle was the mocking faces of her three supposed protectors.


	10. Pride and Terror

**Yay a update, and with a long chapter! **

**I've noticed that people prefer the Voldemort/Hermione interactions (Who can blame you, it's so much fun writing them!) so I will write accordingly. I'm just waiting for Dear old Voldy to crawl back out of the hole he dug to hide in while he licked his wounded pride. The poor guy was not in a good place after what Hermione pulled. **

**This chapter gets a tad dark, so warning for that and a warning for some swearing!**

**Thanks for all the love by following or favoriting this story of mine, and a special thanks to AliceEnchanted and Draca (Guest reviewer) for Reviewing! You make my day :D**

**Xx**

* * *

**Pride and Terror**

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The spell wasn't a strong one, so she managed to break free of it before dinner. Afterwards she quietly made her way to her bedroom, wincing whenever she thought she saw movement.

When she finally got there, she collapsed on the bed, crying herself to sleep.

Before dinner she was woken by a house elf, and no matter how much she pleaded with it, it refused to recount her supposed illness to the matron of the house. So she was forced to make herself presentable, and walk downstairs to sit at a table and be ignored.

She never touched her food, too depressed to want to fill her stomach with anything, only being able to push it away and drink some water.

She carried on to drink what felt like a gallon of water before she was no longer parched. Crying really drained what little reserve she had from breakfast. Being trapped all alone somewhere had meant she hadn't eaten lunch.

Her mind and body refused to eat because of how she felt, that complete and utter sadness that seemed to grip her to the bones. It enveloped her whole being, and filled her soul with despair. But her stomach protested loudly, and clearly, by grumbling; thus interrupting the lady of the house.

"Miss Riddle, eat something." She looked up into the pointed face of Missus Rosier and saw a command in her stilted words. Unable to bring herself to explain why she didn't want to eat, or object to eating at all, she picked up her fork.

When she brought a tiny piece of chicken to her lips and put it in her mouth, the Lady of the house gave her a slight nod and continued her conversation with the Lord of the house. Hermione was very adamant about not looking across the table and meet the blue eyes of her tormentor.

Had she done so, she would have found him bored and unperturbed by whatever ailed her. He hadn't even noticed her stomach rumbling or her late arrival at dinner. He was more concerned about getting out of this dreadful setting himself, family dinner had never been a joyous occasion for him, Hermione had done nothing to change that.

Hermione continued to pick at her food, moving it around to make it look like she had eaten something. Evan was on the other side picking at his food too, but because he was bored. When they were finally excused, someone unbeknownst to the situation would find their movements choreographed. At the exact same time they put down their fork at the appropriate place, said their thank you's for the dinner, and walked in opposite directions. Even the fall of their shoes against the floor was so exact to each other that it sounded like one person was walking away, not two.

For two people so completely different in so many ways, at the core they were the same. Two kids abandoned to themselves by their parents, a hard and distant father who only cared about business, a mother who only saw their kid as a burden and spent all their time showing their affection via gifts. Two kindred hearts starved for affection, acting out against each other in a constant battle for control and power.

They only struck out when they knew they could get away with it, so far they had yet to actually have a fair fight, one being incapacitated in some way. First he could not raise his wand in defense for fear of her father, now she had no wand, and he had no patience.

* * *

Around a corner, under a servant and a ladder, skidding across an expanse of floor, choosing between three doors and fighting the tears.

Her feet clattered and swept over the floor, her legs continuing at the same breakneck pace in a rhythm that beat with her heart. Thighs were chaffing against each other, sweat and pants making them burn and turn red like she had previously only noticed when she had been swimming. Pushing against her throat, her heart pumped wildly to sustain her escape.

Mouth open to get more oxygen, and eyes darting to find routes or hiding places, she did not dare think about anything but what lay ahead. The only thing that she wanted to think about being her getaway, but the pressure and emotions of being pursued by three angry boys with wands were too much, she could think of nothing else.

Every day the same, if they saw her, she ran, if they didn't she jumped at every sound. She slept more to get enough energy to go through the day, but couldn't fall asleep at night for fear of being attacked in her sleep.

She was aware that the boys could not get into her room, but logical thinking did not pierce through fear that easily. When she finally awoke she was ushered out by house elves, because according to Lady Rosier, one does not stay in the bedroom for anything other than sleep when you were a young Lady.

How she loathed who she was, and the situation she was in. As she ran, she did not notice the tears brimming, she only succumbed to them when she once in a blue moon found a hiding space out of sight from The Boys.

Too often they were so close to her that she had no time to crawl into hidey holes or hide behind a corner until they passed her.

It had been a struggle to keep strong enough to keep escaping them, to keep her chin up in front of His parents, to avoid questions and plaster on a smile. Idly she wondered if her father would care if he found out about the boys, or if he thought it would build character.

Now there was a pattern to it all, she would get out of bed, eat breakfast in her room, and be pushed out the door only to find the boys waiting for her or have a prank set up. Then she would either get out of their hold, or at least try, or start running from them. They would laugh like Hyenas when she took off, or when they saw a chip in her armor, gloating in her misery.

When they had grown tired of tormenting her for a while, they had lunch together, sometimes His mother or father joining them or coming by to make sure everything was in order. After Lunch the boys would take off, and she would breathe out and go to the library, and stay there in peace. The library was much too close to where the Lady and Lord spent their time, and anything that happened in there might be heard by them.

For some odd reason, Hermione found herself protecting them from being found out by His parents as much as the boys avoided doing anything in front of them. There was a strange sort of camaraderie, one that Hermione loathed that she kept.

If she had looked deeper into herself she would have found that it was not for their sake that she did it. Pride was a deadly sin not because of what it made you do to others, but what it did to yourself. Her torture could have been cut short, or avoided completely had she found it in herself to utter a word of it to either adult in the house, or by writing a letter to her father, but she never did.

Since coming to the Rosier Castle she and her father had yet to make contact with each other, both too stubborn and prideful to break the silence. A small part of her wished that he would do anything towards her in retaliation for her set up with the house, but once again he disappointed her.

As always nothing made her father proud, and nothing made him set boundaries. She was neglected and left for the wolves, her only weapon snatched from her before she had a chance to use it.

The castle became well known to her as she continued to run its halls trying to escape Their clutches, all of its secrets laid out before her. Sometimes she found things by such a huge coincidence, or exactly when she was in the most dire need for refuge that she wondered if the Castle was trying to help her.

One day everything changed again.

She was sitting in the library after Lunch, thinking her torment over for the day, when suddenly she was surrounded.

With her back to the wall, the two goons; Shoulders and Lanky, blocked her exit. She looked up, trying to hide her fear, but she shifted to make herself seem smaller.

"Hello." Lanky purred in a tone that made Hermione's back shiver.

"What do you want?" her voice did not come out like a threat, the way it had done back at Hogwarts when the roles were reversed. It was shaky, doubtful, and meek, everything that made the predator instinct in the boys roar to life.

They wanted blood, her blood, and without Evan to rein them in and make sure she wasn't badly hurt; they were going to get it.

Both boys sported grins that made Hermione drop her book and look for exits.

"We just want to chat darling."

Her eyes shifted between them, jumping back and forth, waiting for an attack "About what?"

"You think you are safe in here don't you?" Shoulders said, hunching over to tower above her more than before. Her form was completely encased in his shadow now, and she feared for her safety more than ever.

Nothing she said would mean escape, and nothing she did could stop them from whatever they planned to do.

The stacks of books to her left, the ones she had been dying to read, was set in flames. Lanky's wand was outlined against the flicker of the flames that were mirrored in his eyes. Hermione felt her breath quicken in fear, and she looked over to Shoulders who suddenly surged forward and hit her in the eye.

They continued like this, Lanky burning books or tearing them up in front of her, while Shoulders beat her. She began to feel tired and wished for the blackness to take her once again, something she found herself doing often in Castle Rosier. But before it could once again descend on her The Son came and stopped them from continuing, leaving her beaten in a pile of destroyed books.

Crying there, she never noticed him looking back at her, and how his eyes turned sad for a second.

When she regained her bearings she looked at the book closest to her, it was the only one she had managed to get with her from back home, her favorite book since she was eight. As she picked it up with trembling hands to check if there was anything left she could salvage she felt the familiar burn of tears in her eyes.

Destroyed, completely and utterly with no hope to salvage even a single page, the book felt light in her arms.

Suddenly something inside her shifted, where before there was only misery, now Hermione felt red hot anger fill her soul, bursting forward from the darkness, filling the deep dark corners she denied having. There was something sweet about the way only anger remained, her pity party was over.

Fuck them all, Hermione was not going to let this continue, from now on she was going to be the true Slytherin nobody saw her as. Time to stop feeling sorry for herself and start to do something about it.


	11. Revenge is sweeter than you ever were

**I was going to update tomorrow but figured with all the nice reviews and everything I should update**** today! Next chapter is more Voldy/ Hermione action, this chapter has a much more Slytherin Hermione. I'm basing the pureblood customs on Jane Austen novels, any suggestions you would like to add for as strange magical costums, just let me know! **

**Thanks to p****urple breeze, AliceEnchanted and ****ShadowPrincess1621 for their lovely reviews! And thanks to everyone who followed or favorited my story! **

**(Ps fan fiction is a bitch to write on with your phone, so many issues! And my laptop is being a humongous pain as well, makes it difficult to write but not impossible) **

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**Revenge is Sweeter Than You Ever Were**

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She had stayed up all night going over everything she knew about them. It had taken her a while, but she had started to make the lists that everyone, even her fellow Ravenclaws, seemed to hate.

One was pointing out all of their weaknesses, one for their spellwork - cataloguing and mapping out their possible level - the third was a list of possible pranks to pull on them, and the last one was for possible counter attacks.

First thing she did was test out her theories regarding their spellwork, this unfortunately meant enduring more pranks and nasty curses thrown at her, but she soon found out that the three boys were competent for first years, but not up to her level of expertise.

Not having a wand meant a lot less options for counter strikes against them, but knowing their level, she also knew what 'Muggle' means she could use against them. And the handful of things she could somewhat do without a wand were going to be used in creative ways against them.

They were not adept at hiding what they did from the Rosier Matriarch or Patriarch, only managing so far because of their rooms distance to the part of the castle used to entertain guests. She also noticed that they hadn't found all the secret passages, some of them she had managed to use to get away from them.

The library, to Hermione's great pleasure, was not far from where the Parlor, Study and Entrance was, allowing her peace and quiet when guests were entertained. So for some time she cooped up there and scooped out more details about the castle, the Rosier family, and Pureblood customs. Most of which were derived by a combination of Hermione's memories of spying on her father's meetings or having to chat with the Death Eater wives, and novels written by wizards.

The most important things she picked up meant that her standing with the Matron of the house had improved. She noticed that Hermione now held the actions of a proper Pureblood, and started to respect her more for it. This resulted in her son being goaded into acting more like the proper pureblood gentleman, and whenever he was caught doing anything untoward against Hermione, his mother would give him a scolding.

"I will get you for this Hermione." He smiled angrily and kissed the back of her hand while talking through his clenched teeth.

She did a small curtsy and looked down her nose at him while giving him the polite smile of a Lady "Why Mister Rosier, I am a Lady!" she said with a gasp, to result in a narrow eyed look from Lady Rosier watching over their interactions. She had caught the Rosier son brushing hard against Hermione's shoulder while trying to pass her, making her step falter. This had resulted in another scolding and Rosier having to pretend to apologize to their esteemed guest.

Hermione had of course orchestrated the whole thing. She knew when the Lady of the house would be out, and when his friends were coming over.

"What did he say to you Miss Riddle?"

"Nothing that is proper for a Lady to repeat, my Lady." She kept her eyes downcast, and tried her hardest to blush and make it seem more plausible that he had actually said something deemed reprehensible for a woman to hear from a man.

Hermione thought it was hilarious, and kept antagonizing him so he would mess up more. It also resulted in an uptake of nasty curses and pranks from the boys, but the small satisfaction was worth it, this was just part 1 of her deliberate plan to get him back.

By the curl of his lip, and his eyes clouding over, she knew he hated her even more now. For a Slytherin, he didn't seem to be very cunning yet.

"Excuse me my Lady, I must get back to my studies." Hermione said before the tirade would be directed at the son. When she passed him, she gave him a smirk, and returned to her book. For some reason, one of the pureblood customs was for women to take 'walks' around their homes while reading. Or take walks around the house while talking with another woman of good standing, something Hermione planned to take advantage of the next time the pureblood ladies gathered for tea.

Her recent attempt at old traditions meant the Lady Rosier had invited her to attend a tea party to be held the next week.

When the day was upon them, Hermione did a splendid job of entertaining the other women, while on the inside she was ready to kill herself. So far the most thought provoking subject had been cookies versus cakes! Although it had turned into more of a bashing against cookies, because they were too modern, just thinking about it made Hermione roll her eyes at them.

Afterwards she had taken to inviting one of the Death Eater Wives to join her on a walk around the house while the others took a walk around the gardens. The wife in question had become ill she said, and didn't want to risk anything by going outside. A ridiculous thought that had fit Hermione's plans perfectly.

The boys didn't know about the tea, and they didn't know Hermione was considered a Lady of standing now. They would discover the importance of paying attention to grownups very soon.

A couple of days earlier Hermione had pranked them with a very simple setup. One she was sure they would copy and use against her, like they had done so many times before. She had spotted them setting up the trap earlier that day when she had spied on them behind a painting in a secret passage.

The first time they had walked through a door to be drenched thoroughly in water had made her sides hurt with laughter. They were like drowned kittens, and they walked stiffly forwards when their limbs had stiffened up from the cold water. Sounds of very ungentlemanly manner had sprung from their mouths and she had barely escaped swift retribution by downing another bucket at them when they tried to run towards her.

The Lady being drenched alongside Hermione did not make such a funny picture however, and the three boys standing proudly on the other side of the door to watch their handy work were shocked. It was hard for her to not laugh at their miserable expressions, especially Shoulders was terrified, it turned out that Hermione had taken his mother for a walk, Lady Mulciber.

Hermione sputtered and apologized for the boys, somehow 'accidentally' letting it slip that this was not the first thing they had done against her.

"What else have they done to you?!"

"Lady Mulciber, they are just boys, they mean no harm." Hermione tried meekly, she wondered if trying to contain her laughter made her an even worse actress than before. The looks the boys were sending her assured her that they were not convinced of her supposed compassion.

"Mom I-"

"Save it!" she put up an arm to stop her son from continuing, and he looked down in shame. "I am going to take you three boys down with me, and then all three of us mums will decide on your punishment together." They gulped and sent Hermione nasty looks, but had not concealed it to well, making Lady Mulciber even more angry at them.

Part 2 was a success, Hermione wondered if all steps of her plan would be this easy to manage. She didn't consider if once again her Pride would be in the way of her own safety and happiness.


	12. Posse

**Some bad news for you; I'm not sure when the next time I am able to update is. My computer has gone mental and decided I shouldn't be able to log onto it any more... I'll try and write everything on my phone, but that means everything will be typed slower etc. I'm planning on getting a new pc soon, but depending on how much work I get (I work as a call in temp, meaning I wake up most mornings not knowing if I have a job that day) idk when that would be. So I'm sorry if I can't update weekly like I want to, but just know that this story is not abandoned, and I am going to try my best to write a new chapter every week. Also there might be a lot of grammatical errors in this chapter, I will try and reread it again to weed them out, but if you notice any that bother you, please let me know. The wonderful purple breeze saw that I had replaced Rosier with Nott in the last chapter so I went through and changed them (again thanks for letting me know) which I think is because I've been reading the wonderful story "Tying the Nott " which you should all check out if you like fluff. **

**Thanks for all the love with followers and favorites, and my wonderful reviews (AliceEnchanted and Purple breeze). And I hope you enjoy some voldy silliness and Hermione pranks**

**Ps: I am considering giving Voldemort a ridiculous hobby, as of right now he is a very one dimensional character and I'd like to change that. So any suggestions on his silly fault is welcome (anything from muggles to magical to plain weird is perfect in my book) [I blame reading all of Rorschach Blot's stories and odd Ideas on the idea of getting him a hobby]**

**Xxx**

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**Posse**

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Hermione had a posse.

A ridiculous thing for a friendless 12 year old but here she was, strolling down Diagon Alley with a dozen people following her.

The only one that was walking with her was her dad.

It had been an hour of going through stores and they had yet to talk to each other. The rest of the 'crew' nervous by their silence didn't dare to say anything in case they would face the wrath of the Dark Lord.

Hermione on the other hand, was bored and wanted this silence to be over. But she wasn't going to be the one to break it.

She still didn't have her wand, so wandlessly she cast a tripping hex towards her father. It wasn't strong, but it was enough to send him flying into the puddle in front of him. When he looked up he was furious, his eyes turning red in fury.

"Hermione" he growled.

"Dad I don't even have a wand, how was I supposed to do that?" She gave him her best innocent look, hoping he would buy it.

He checked his pockets to make sure, and of course there was both his wand and hers. "You sure it wasn't just you being clumsy?" She blinked, making her eyes big with fake curiosity.

"I am the Dark Lord!" he stood up and tried to brush some of the dirt off. "I am not clumsy!" he used his wand to take off the rest of the dirt, while Hermione had to fight the fit of giggles that was threatening to overtake her.

Hermione shrugged "If you say so." and sent a quick look towards the Rosier kid, which her father of course saw. His eyes narrowed, thinking the kid had been the one to send the hex towards him. Seeing her ploy working, she tried to put up pleading eyes, like she was hoping he wouldn't hurt Rosier.

But the Dark Lord was undeterred, and stalked forward, towering over him, making him whimper in fright. "Did you do it?" there was froth in the corner of his mouth, like he was a tiny angry pitbull.

Before the Rosier kid could try and answer, his father picked up his wand and cast priori incantatem on it, revealing the last spell to be a tripping hex. Of course at the time, he had sent it towards Hermione, this was just her way of taking revenge yet again. The added bonus of pissing her father off was a very nice bow on the top.

While her father started yelling at the boy, promising he was going to regret it, she snuck into the bookstore. Mulciber had been the only one to notice, and tried to follow her. He was not subtle enough and got yelled at by the Dark Lord, and couldn't get a word in to explain why he tried to get away.

So she got some peace and solitude again, being free to roam the bookstore at her leisure.

It didn't take long before her father stormed in after her, murder in his eyes. Absentmindedly she hoped that he hadn't killed the boy, she wasn't done playing with him. With the whole torturing of her being slightly derailed by her attempts to make his life hell, it had become amusing to have Rosier around.

"What do you think you are doing?!" There was the froth again, some foaming in his mouth, and angry red eyes narrowing at her.

"Looking at books?" she motioned towards the tomes she had been browsing with a raised eyebrow. "Like I told you earlier?"

"You didn't say anything." He seemed hesitant though, like he was trying to think back on earlier.

"Yeah I did, didn't you send Mulciber after me? He started going after me last I saw at least?" she continued down the row of books, picking up another one to look at.

"No I didn't" he furrowed his brows.

"My fault then, sorry Dad." She put the book back, leaned up and gave him a kiss on the cheek, and he looked mortified. As she continued walking through the store, he was frozen in place by the simple intimate gesture that was common among parents and their children.

Of course, he was Lord Voldemort, and such small gestures of affection were foreign to him, something Hermione knew quite well. But she couldn't resist doing it when his response were so dramatic. And he had completely lost his train of thought, meaning she most likely got out of whatever epic rant he had about her not going off.

"All of these?!" the cashier gasped, Hermione had brought enough books to the register to fill a bookcase (or two).

"Yes please." She smiled at the cashier.

"Uh- and how will you be paying for them?"

"Dad?!" she called out, snapping Voldemort out of his trance. His eyes had gone back to the striking green the Pureblood ladies kept gushing about. Bellatrix had commented that they were uncannily similar to the color of her second favorite spell, which only the inner circle of Death Eaters used a lot, the killing curse. He walked over and paid for the books without thinking twice about it. The only thing Hermione knew without a doubt that they shared, was their love for books.

"Do you want me to shrink them for you?" the kind cashier asked.

"Yes please." Hermione answered.

But before she could raise her wand and do so Voldemort did it and snatched them with a sneer. "We'll manage."

He stormed out without a backwards glance, the cashier looking very shocked by his behavior. "Thank you." Hermione smiled again, and the woman looked at her with disbelief "Bye!" she said, and followed her father who was glaring daggers at the woman from the front door. Apparently Hermione had ruined his dramatic exit.

Sometimes she thought that he should be called the Drama Queen, not the Dark Lord. Before he could make eye contact and use legilimens to see her exact thoughts, she turned on strolled down the street once more.

"Ice cream!" she squealed, and ran into the little parlor before her father could stop her. When he and the aforementioned posse could catch up with her and stop her, she had already ordered and gotten herself one. "Which one do you want Daddy?" big eyes once more, and some scuffling from the Death Eaters to get away from his wrath, and still he did not answer.

"How about Licorice, it's black, like your soul." Any other person on the world might have gotten offended by something like that, but if the Dark Lord's heart could melt by anything, it was appraisals like that from his daughter.

"No." he responded, still not happy about being in such a brightly covered building.

"Then chocolate? Or Vanilla! Everybody loves Vanilla."

His only response was a grumble. "I'm not going to stop until you pick one." She singsonged as she continued devouring her own ice cream.

"caramel" he sighed, hoping to get this done with quick.

"Two scoops caramel it is!" she said with cheer, getting another cone from the man behind the counter, and skipped over to her dad and gave it to him.

"Let's enjoy it out in the sun!" and before he could say no, he went out after her.

Little cute innocent looking Hermione sitting at a table surrounded by a bunch of scary looking dudes in black caught many people's attention. She was positively beaming, while her father absentmindedly ate his own ice cream and the rest of the group tried to remain in the background. Hermione had to stuff her face to keep from laughing at the curious passers by, and the haughty looks the Death Eaters sent back at them and to her. Out of the corner of her eye she could see a slight twitch sometimes on the corner of Voldemort's mouth, like part of him was enjoying himself.

They were all so out of place, with dark clothes, pale skin, and horrid attitudes. The Alley was filled with people laughing and enjoying their time out in the sun, or having a joyous day off shopping. Why her father had picked this day out of all the others was curious, you'd think he would pick one of the many rainy days that london had, to keep from dealing with smiling faces like this.

Many a respectable lady gushed at the sight of Voldemort sitting in the sun with his daughter, Hermione caught words like 'Adorable', 'such a handsome fella', and 'wish I was with someone like him' and many a sighs of longing.

With every single one, her father's brow creased in annoyance.

"Do you have anything else you need?" she looked up to see the tip of his nose covered in ice cream, the surrounding Death Eaters silently debating wether or not they should tell him about it.

She took a moment to think about it "No dad."

"Good." He said, seeing her finished with her cone, he dropped his own without a second thought, to land on the Rosier kids robe. It smeared down into his lap, the icy goodness landing in his crotch, making him jump up and yell from the cold. Her father then stood up without a glance at the kid, and took Hermione's arm to lead her to the apparation point and take her back to her prison.

All in all, it was a pretty good day, and Hermione went to bed with a smile on her face, knowing she had succeeded way beyond what she thought she could. Using her father against Rosier once again might have been bad form, but for her it was taking out two birds with one stone.


	13. Scorching Summer

**yay I found inspiration to write more, even if I am using stupid notebooks on my android and this site on my mobile (not sure if you know how much a pain this site is if you have missed grammar errors and have to go back and fix them. If I miss something, tell me in a pm or review, criticism makes me grow as an author after all. And this is the last time I will bitch about how I overlook words etc, it's just that I know how much they bother me in a story, especially if people continue to write it wrong (biggest peeve being people that mix up quiet, quit and quite) **

**On another note, I am super inspired right now for writing this, I am doing my best to write another one before my eurotrip (starting on the 1st of August and ending on the 22 of September approximately) but when I'm out travelling I have little access to internet. So if you have to wait a while you know why, but this story will not be abandoned! **

**As always thanks so much to every follower and everyone that has put this story in their favorites. I blush like mad whenever I see an email from this site alerting me off it. Special thanks to my reviewers; AliceEnchanted and ****purple breeze, you make my day! **

**Ps: Longest Chapter yet!**

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**Scorching Summer**

* * *

The manor was very quiet for the next few days. The adults were out most of the time, and the boys kept out of sight. With the return to Hogwarts coming up, and the many books Hermione had procured on their little trip, she felt like she was in heaven.

But sadly all good things most come to an end.

Another dreadful tea party with the high society Purebloods came up, thankfully the last before her return to Hogwarts, but with it came other girls her age.

She had another part of her plan that involved the ladies, she needed to talk with them and somehow not be interrupted by the girls her age. The last thing she would do to Rosier before their return to school.

The day came, and she was introduced to them all, the ones she needed to pay attention to (at least that she could tell from the whispers in her ear from Lady Rosier) were Bellatrix and Narcissa Black and Lorraine Yaxley.

Narcissa was nice enough, one year younger than Lucius Malfoy, the head of her body guard team at Hogwarts (at least that's how she saw it.) She told her all about how she hoped they would be engaged soon, an opinion most of the ladies at the tea parties mirrored.

Lorraine was a year younger than Hermione, starting Hogwarts soon and hoping to end up in Slytherin. From what Bellatrix whispered in her ear Lorraine was quite enamoured with the young Rosier son, and hoped to snag him. Hermione silently thought that she could have the little brat, and hoped that her attention took his focus off Hermione.

She soon formed a strange friendship with Bellatrix, but was taken aback when she discovered why she was so interested in becoming Hermiones friend. Narcissa quietly told her about Bella's infatuation with her father.

They all insisted she call them Lorry, Cissa and Bella respectively, and gave her the nickname Merry. They explained it was from her middle name Merope, and Hermione fave them a tight lipped smile that barely passed for genuine (she didn't understand why Slytherins like them couldn't see through it, on the other hand maybe they did but choose to ignore it.) At least it wasn't something stupid like Mione or Herms.

"Do you think your father will show up to this?" Bellatrix asked, the hope in her voice shinning through, the smile at the thought hid behind her cup of tea being brought to her lip.

"To ladies tea?" Narcissa raised an eyebrow at her sister.

Bellatrix looked away and took a sip from her almost empty cup, making a slight slurping noise that earned her a glare from her mother at the other table.

"I won't see him until he sends me off to Hogwarts again I imagine." Hermione said, putting another cucumber sandwich on her plate. She could never get enough to eat at these things. She usually didn't eat much, but the tiny sizes and light dishes meant she only got hungrier when she tried filling up her empty stomach with the tiny snacks.

Bellatrix sighed at that "I was hoping I'd get a glimpse of him." She mumbled.

"Wouldn't your fiancee mind?" Lorraine asked carelessly.

Bellatrix sent her a glare.

"I wouldn't think so, isn't he joining his organization Bella?" Narcissa asked, trying to derail her sister from throttling the girl.

"Yes he is Cissa! Hopefully I will get to join too, oh wouldn't that be wonderful Merry, I could come over to your house all the time and we could talk about our hair and clothes, maybe even about your crush on the young Rosier." She wiggled her eyebrows at her.

Hermione hid her discomfort at the thought of Bellatrix spending that much time with her, by voicing her opinion on the boy.

"I find him dreadful. He has been nothing but a thorn in my side this summer. It is sad too, I have had such wonderful hosts in the Lady Rosier and Lord Rosier."

She noticed the narrow eyes from Lorraine by Bellatrix's question, and the exhale at Hermiones answer. Hopefully Lorraine wouldn't turn into an enemy, she was just scathing by with Narcissa and her intendeds body guard duties.

"I think he's wonderful" Lorraine said wistfully, which earned a giggle from the Black sisters, Hermione barely containing her eye roll.

"I heard that Hermione has been seen with the young Fenwick at Hogwarts." Narcissa said, which made Hermione blush.

"The blood traitor?!" Bellatrix gasped in horror.

"He's just a friend." Hermione mumbled.

Narcissa raised an eyebrow at that, making Hermione scramble to change the topic "what about your fiancee Bellatrix?"

"He knows better than to associate with anybody but purebloods. She sniffed.

Hermione rolled her eyes "of course, I meant who is he? How is he like? That sort of thing, I'm afraid I haven't even heard his name."

That sent Bellatrix on a long winded explanation about everything Rodulphus Lestrange. By the end of it Hermione was sure she knew more about the man than she knew about herself. Bellatrix had after all gone into an outline of his family tree and her own. Hermione only really knew she was descended from Merope Gaunt, and they were descended from Salazar Slytherins himself.

Bellatrix ended the monologue by explanation of blood purity and the sentence "but of course you come from Salazar Slytherins himself don't you Merry?"

Hermione felt the silence that followed her sentence slammer inwards on her, she suddenly had the attention of everyone in the room. The older ladies knew better than too stare at her, but she saw their stiff postures, and the grips on the fine China. Curiously enough she saw the age of everyone in the group at that moment by how well they hid that they were waiting for her answer. The oldest lady there was nibbling on a crab sandwich like she had no idea that everyone else was holding their breath.

"That is true, father told me of our great and powerful ancestor long ago. Most people don't question it when they know of father's ability to talk to snakes." Her answer made most ladies breathe out and hide better that they were listening intently on the conversation now, but some of them had to hide their faces so they wouldn't show their fear at that statement. Bellatrix eyes shot up by the glare Hermione sent her, and her insinuation that she questioned the Dark Lord.

For some unfathomable reason, Hermione cared a great deal about her ancestry being questioned. Maybe it had something to do with the way her father would react when people did, or maybe she just didn't react well to people who took too much of an interest in her personal business.

"Can you do it?" Lorraine blurted out, making both Hermiones and Bellatrix's eyes snap from their intense hold on each other, and down onto her.

"Of course." She scoffed.

"Show us." Lorraine breathed.

"Speaking to snakes is not a parlour trick _Lorry._" She winced at Hermione tone, and the older Ladies suddenly found that they had a lot to talk about. Even if she was just a young girl, Hermione was the Dark Lords daughter, and falling out or not, that meant her power far exceeded theirs. When she was just a baby they had learned that making her cry for any reason whatsoever meant a crucio from the Dark Lord himself. Thankfully she had been a very quiet child.

"Please!" Lorraine pleaded, clearly not knowing when to stop.

"Snakes have very little to talk about, mostly it is about eating or sleeping. But they also have a sort of _hunger _to kill." She paused for dramatic effect, tilting her head to the side and giving Lorraine a meaningful look. "So what it is you want me to talk to them about?"

Narcissa suddenly jumped in to change the subject, Lorraine gulping while Hermione continued to stare at her. She might be much more amicable than her father, kind and caring, and a Ravenclaw, but that didn't mean she wasn't going to threaten a girl that wouldn't stop pestering her. It was something she wouldn't have done at the start of her summer, but now she did. Her father would have been very proud of her in that moment, the thought of that made Hermione stop staring down the girl, and put her mind to getting the boys off her back.

Narcissas question of anticipation for Hogwarts provided an excellent in.

"I'm not sure how I feel about it. The boys continue to follow me around and I don't know how that looks. What if people get the wrong idea and start to question my virtue?"

Sadly that was not how to go about it. She was suddenly overwhelmed with the mother's of said boys talking her down, saying they know that the boys would not dare to lay a finger on her. When they were done chastising her, Narcissa started, saying her boyfriend would never so such a thing, that he had been nothing but a gentleman to her.

Hermione protest against them by saying she was assured they would not touch her, did not change what others thought.

Suddenly the loud and horrid Walburga Black butted in, saying that the daughter of the Dark Lord should not worry about finding a husband, and that she should be assured of the boys destruction if they actually did lay a finger on her. She was also told that her role as his daughter was not to question him, but to be his most loyal follower.

For the remainder of the tea party, Hermione stayed pretty silent, she was mad that her plans of getting the boys off her back had not worked, she was starting to resign to the fact that she would have another year of trying to avoid the snobbish brats. And the parting words of Walburga assuring her that her son Regulus would never be anything but a gentleman made her heart sink more. Because it meant she was getting another boy following her every move.

* * *

She was laying out in the sun, glad for the temporary reprieve from the Rosiers son usually swift revenge. Maybe he was embracing his inner Slytherin, like she had, and was planning ahead instead of jumping into ill thought out bullying.

Somehow she doubted that, it was more likely the incident in Diagon Alley had left him with ringing ears and warnings to stay away.

The spot she was sitting at was her favorite, it had taken her a while to find it. It was close enough to the castle that they could see her resting spot, and they wouldn't send someone to bring her in, but far enough away that she got peace and quiet.

She stretched out in the sun with her book, one of the few she had salvaged from a particularly nasty burning previously in the summer. The edges were still frayed and scorched slightly, but she thought it made the book seem cosy, like Hogwarts itself. The book was _"Hogwarts a history"_ one she had read many times over. She never tired of it, and she knew that it was her father's favorite too. One of the few things they had in common was their love for the magical school in Scotland. Although in his typical fashion, it was not something they actually bonded over.

Over the years she had learned that the only things he wanted to bond over was murder and torture. He indulged her by giving her books and access to his Library, but their shared love for books was never brought up by either of them, and casually brushed aside if one of his followers brought it up in his presence.

Another thing that was good about this spot was that she could see anyone coming for her from far away, like she could see the Son and his cronies walking towards her with purpose.

She gently put away the book, leaning back to get a better angle to look up at them when they would finally stand before her.

They surrounded her, her back to the tree, and them blocking her sides, Rosier standing in front of her, his arms crossed over his chest as he stared down his nose at her.

"Boys." She nodded at them. "What can I help you with?"

"The usual." Rosier shrugged and sent her a smirk.

Then the boys lit her tree on fire, Hermione picked up her book quickly, and jumped away from it before she could catch on fire too, She bumped into Rosier, the boy sending her a dirty glare before shoving her away from him. Her feet scrambled to keep her upright, but she failed.

She tumbled down to the laughter of the boys. The stood around her in a circle, the heat from the burning tree making the nice summer's day seem unbearably hot all of a sudden.

"Look at the little thing, all covered in ash and dirt. I think she needs a bath, don't you boys?" The cronies threw their heads back with laughter while he covered her with water. As she sputtered and tried to shield herself with her arms, she briefly thought that those boys would laugh at anything.

The water didn't stop coming, and Hermione had no way of escaping their lame attempt at revenge with them on either side of her. So she kicked out at Rosier, hitting him somewhere, he toppled over, falling on top of her.

As the water seized to cover her frame, Hermione gasped for breath again. While her breathing steadied, she noticed her chest bumping against something when she inhaled. She opened her eyes and looked up into the brilliant blue eyes of Rosier. The colors reminded her of the quiet after a storm, of life and sun and lazy summer days looking at the clear blue sky. Still water in a quiet lake, flowers springing out in spring and the familiarity of her house colors. There was an intensity behind them, and warmth that surprised her.

He looked down into her eyes ans saw the same warmth in them that she saw in his. He was reminded of chocolate on cold winter days, honey in his tea when he was sick, dirty knees when he had been out playing, the color of Qudditch brooms and so many other things he loved. The colors were swirling as he could see her mind whirring.

"Get off me." She ground out suddenly, surprising both of them.

"Glad to." He answered, and jumped off and stepped away from her.

Neither admitted to themselves that they had been lost in each other's eyes, enemies don't do that sort of thing.

"This is the best you could do?" She asked, and he looked over at her dripping frame. How she could still make a terrifying figure when she was soaked through, standing in front of her favorite tree being burned to ashes, was something Evan Rosier could not fathom. He had always feared her in small part for her father's influence. But the more time they were forced to spend together that summer, the more he saw off this figure, of the Hermione that could stand tall no matter what. This person scared him, that confidence that she exuded from every pore was something he longed to have himself. And her control over magic without a wand was immensely impressive and something few could match, even as adults.

"You burn a tree in your own back yard and make me a little wet? Pathetic!" She brushed herself off, wringing her dress to get rid of some water, and picked up her book. She noticed that it had escaped the worst of Rosiers spell, only becoming slightly wet on the outside, most of which she brushed off.

She flicked her wet hair behind her shoulder, making a few droplets splatter on the three boys, and sauntered off with her head held high, leaving a wet trail behind her. Evan tried not to admit to himself that Hermione was definitely a force to be reckoned with, a force that he and his friends had made their mission to anger. He gulped as his two best friend laughed at her retreating form, complimenting him on his work with the water spell.

This year was going to be a rough one.


	14. Leaving

**Strongly considering getting a beta now, would be nice to have someone spell check for me and help me avoid traps like mentioning one event with two different outcomes. Struggled with this chapter because I kept having to fact check within my own story. Sorry it's so late. Also I kept debating what age Benjy should be... last year he was a 3rd year, this year he is a 4th. The reason shall become clearer as they get older. **

**Thanks for the follows, favs and my wonderful reviewers: purple breeze and AliceEnchanted and the 2 guest reviews! **

**Xx**

* * *

**Leaving**

* * *

Rosier had avoided her for the remainder of her stay. She was quite pleased with this, especially as the approach of Hogwarts came closer, and with that what she considered rescue from this dreadful place with horrible young boys that tormented her, adults that ignored her and parties she was sure had been designed to torture women.

Not to mention being able to get her wand back. She sorely missed it, her father had gotten her a toy one when she was really young, she remembered the feeling and joy of first getting one, but was unsure of her age at the time. It had come about after she had stolen her father's on several occasions to play with. He had found no way of stopping her from taking it, only discovering the thievery at the worst possible moment.

He had yelled at her, she had stomped her foot. He had told her off his embarrassment, she had told him how she had turned the cutlery into flowers. He had yelled at her for doing that, she had said that it was Voldemort himself that had taught her the spell.

When he had paused, she had taken the opportunity to go into a very well prepared explanation arguing that she should have her own wand, and at the end he just stared at her, mouth open and blinking. Hermione kept still, winded and out of breath after her monologue, hoping she had gotten through to him.

Finally he had muttered out a yes and she had squealed and forgotten his weird thing with touching and given him a hug. After her exclamations of "thank you thank you thank you!" She had jumped back and mumbled an excuse for hugging him before handing over his wand and scurrying off.

She had caught a small glimpse of her father smiling for the first time ever after she had hugged him, and that was something she would always remember. So rarely had she seen him smile like that, and when she did see it she needed to run off before he could turn sour again, ruining the moment.

Later they were both furious to find out that kids weren't allowed wands, only toy ones that hardly did anything. When she accidentally set several wands in Ollivanders shop on fire her father had just stared at her, and with her following tirade he had continued to do so, with a calculating look.

It was the same calculating look he had given her right before leaving her with the Rosier for one more week.

At times she almost wished she hadn't gone to such extremes against her father earlier that summer. But then she remembered the look on his face and the satisfaction she felt and put that thought away.

Summer was dwindling down, and with a few more peaceful days in the sun, Hermione soaking up the sun like a Snake taking a nap, she couldn't be anything but content. Even though something in the back of her mind reminded her off the upcoming tragedy of her "bodyguards" returning to duty.

* * *

"Hermione!" A voice over the hustle and bustle of student saying adieu to their parents before embarking on a train ride to Hogwarts again. The engine roared and almost made her miss the male voice that called her name in joy, the only one at that.

She smiled and waved back at Benjy, but before she could take another step a cold hand landed on her shoulder holding her back. "I would advise against such endeavours." Came the icy yet saccharine voice of her father.

"Yes sir." Came her mild complacent reply. She was still missing her wand and not about to take any chances by angering him further.

"Where's your luggage?" She pointed to where it was neatly standing next to Rosier. He snapped his fingers, and the three boys her year sprang into action, moving the luggage into the express.

"Really there is no need-" She was cut off by his eyes boring into her, telling beer it was better to yield to him than put up any more resistance. She sighed and appeased herself by thinking a fight over carrying luggage was not where she would take her stand.

Her thought where broken, and the uncomfortable silence and tension between her father and herself, by the sweet voice of Narcissa Black telling the boys to put the luggage in her and Lucius compartment. The man complied by showing the boys where it was situated.

"Merry, darling! So nice to see you." She fought hard not to groan, but the raised eyebrow of her old pa meant some sort of noise must have escaped. That or he found the nickname curious.

"Narcissa! So nice to see you!" She tried, at least her intervening meant she didn't have to deal with the annoying trio of boys at least, so she should be somewhat nice.

"Oh please, I told you to call me Cissa!" Hermiones answer was a tight smile.

"And you must be her father, a pleasure to meet you." She delicately put her hand in his, purred at him and gave a curtsie while bowing her head. Her father was obviously pleased by this display while she rolled her eyes at their archaic foolishness.

"Dad, this is Narcissa Black, a friend of mine." Certainly more of a friend than anyone else her father approved of.

"Pleasure" he said in that special voice he used while flirting or courting Women, very inappropriate when the girl was practically her age.

The situation worsened as they were joined by her sister. "Merry! Its been too long." Bellatrix hugged her to her immense surprise, and the tone of voice and overly friendly greeting was way over the top for a woman Hermione had previously only met once.

"Nice to see you too Bellatrix." The woman giggled like a school girl and said "Bella, please! " while Hermione stared wide eyed and horrified at the display. Even knowing Bellatrix for only a few hours she knew this was not someone you could consider a normal friendly girl.

She turned to her father then, and did the same thing as Narcissa, only with a more flirtatious tone and a hand that trailed up and down his forearm. "And who is this handsome man." She purred, much like her sister, and again Hermione rolled her eyes, shifting from one foot to the other while wishing it was all over with.

"Bellatrix Black, meet my father, Tom Riddle, dad Bella." Why she for once was amenable to using a nickname, she wasn't sure, but if asked she would blame it on wanting to get this all over with. She suspected the only reason Bellatrix so kindly had followed her sister to the train, was the odd chance of being able to meet her infamous father.

"Pleasure" he said again, and only Hermione could hear the forced tone of his voice. After the whole debacle with her mom, he wasn't too happy about easy witches throwing themselves at him. The disposable ones were often not found again after making advances on him. For Bellatrix's sake, she hoped she was indispensable.

After Bellatrix had finished with her inane giggling, she pulled her fiance forward to meet them. "And of course you already know my fiance?" The man bowed respectfully, looking around to make sure no one was in hearing range and intoned in a gruff tone "my Lord."

If it wasn't for her wand in her father's clutches, she would have thrown in the towel ages ago and left this bizarre political introduction and exchanging of pleasantries.

"Bella has told me so much about you." She said, grasping the man's hand to shake.

A frown appeared on her father, seeing a man blatantly touching her hand was an obvious no no, even if he was bound to serve him. When he growled, Rodulphus fearfully drew his hand back, looking up at him while muttering "indeed?"

Hermione smirked at the man, seeing his discomfort and her father's ire. "Oh yes. So many wonderful things, you wouldn't believe the picture she paints of you." She simpered at the man, and he took a step back to hopefully escape the ominous glare of Lord Voldemort, and the consequences of that wrath being directed at him. The man gulped while Hermione now discovered yet another way to mess with Death Eaters while making her father angry and displeased at them.

Narcissa again came to the rescue "oh look at the time, we really must be off if we want to catch the train. Wonderful meeting you sir, I will take good care of Hermione on the train."

His glare shot to Narcissa and in a toneless voice he said "I will hold you to that." Making her gulp as she was for the first time in her life met with the anger of a Dark Lord.

"Bye Daddy!" Hermione gave him a halfway hug and kissed him on the cheek, skillfully sneaking her hand in his pocket to retrieve her wand. Then she skipped off after Narcissa, her day looking up slightly knowing she again had caused strife between the oh so powerful man and one of his subjects.

"Hermione, aren't you forgetting something?" He threw after her while she was still in range for a normal conversation.

She held up her wand and waved it at him. "Love you Daddy, you're the best!" Her sarcasm was oozing off the simple line, noticed by him (She could tell by his frown) but missed by his fan club of cougars standing to the side of the platform.

He noticed when they expressed their joy of such a fine specimen that was also a good dad. He looked very fearful of the clutches of the women standing nearby, and with that Hermione entered the express with a huge malicious grin on her face.

* * *

If Narcissa could tell that the conversation with her father was her being a lot more manipulative then one would guess from someone sorted into Ravenclaw, she couldn't quite tell. But after the little chat outside the express Hermione noticed the fearful looks she sent her way when she thought she wasn't looking.

It could also have something to do with her father's subtle threat, Hermione wasn't sure, but she had decided to ignore her and Lucius (Narcissa kept reminding her off his name, and now she couldn't help but remember it) until the end of he trip.

So she propped up a book on her lap and started to read, pretending to immerse herself in the pages of a book she was sure she had learned by heart now.

The whispered conversation between Narcissa and Lucius broke through her daydream when their voices became increasingly louder. She sighed and made an ladylike snort to stop their obvious argument, and informed them she would decrease the weight her money pouce was putting on her bladder. Which could either mean a bathroom, or going to the cart to spend some money.

It was rude, improper and unlike the mask she had put up in front Narcissa before. However they wished to see it, She would have a moment to herself while they could sort out whatever disagreement was bothering Hermiones musings. If they didn't want to involve her in the discussion, why should she have to put up with her peace being disturbed.

She walked the corridor of the train looking for the candy cart, hoping she wouldn't run into her stalkers.

"Been avoiding me have you?" The friendly voice gave her a freight, and she turned around to be met with the sparkling green eyes of Benjy.

"Benjamin you frightened me!"

He wrinkled his nose "please don't call me that, call me Benjy. All my friends do." Her heart gave a lurch at that, it was the first time someone offered her friendship without expecting anything in return.

"I'm your friend?"

"Of course you are." He sent her a brilliant smile. "Can't compete with all your admirers so I'll settle for friend." He winked at her, making her blush.

"Stalkers you mean." She mumbled and he nudged her good naturally.

"Just another word for admirer." She frowned at that and he laughed and decided to change the subject. "Had a good summer?"

She grimaced "it was horrible from beginning to end." She sighed "at least it's over now."

"Never met anyone who hated summer." He was closer than she had anticipated and she gulped while staring up at him.

"I don't, just the company. I prefer Fall though, give me a good book and some hot cocoa and I'll be the happiest girl alive." She smiled at the thought.

"I'll have to remember that." He winked at her again, and she blushed even more and looked out the window on the passing scenery. The clear blue sky was reflected in the large lake they were passing by, reminding her of the calm blue eyes of Rosier, and she turned away to get rid of that image.

"What about you, how was your summer?"

"Brilliant, good friends, family and flying my broom, nothing better than summer in my opinion." He grinned at the memory, while she wistfully hoped for the same things in her future, minus the broom of course. "You should have come say hi when I called you, my parents would have loved you I'm sure."

"I don't think so, especially if my father tagged along."

"You're father is not a nice guy I take it?" His tone was light, like he didn't really expect her to confirm how bad he really was.

"Oh he's a Dark Lord, you know what they're like." He laughed at her, and she realized that the perfectionist persona her father had created might fool more than just his followers. Maybe the Fenwicks would love her father, eating out of his hand while he gave them thinly wielded insults about being blood traitors. Usually people only realized what he had said when they looked back upon conversations with him.

"I can without a doubt say I don't know anything about those." He replied when he had finally cooled down.

"Well I only know my father, think he's the only one around these days."

"Well if you're going to be something be the best! And if he's the only one around he obviously is."

She frowned at him "you're weird."

Before he could respond to that the gruesome twosome arrived. Or as she also liked to think of them, Rosiers henchmen. She groaned "what do you two want?"

"We wanted to remind you that you shouldn't talk to blood traitors." Shoulders said.

"You're father wouldn't like it." Lanky continued.

"And I'd like to remind you of several things." She turned towards them, giving them a hateful glare "one I have my wand back!" She held it up to show them "two I'm not afraid to use it!" Their eyebrows shot up, looking at he stick in fear. "Three, you don't tell me what to do." She held up her hand before they could reply to that, stopping their half assed excuse "and finally four, neither does my father."

They had taken several steps back to get away from her, while she gave them the stink eye. The tension was broken by Benjys laughter "well I gotta get going anyway, nice to talk to you Hermione."

She stopped paying attention to the two idiots and smiled back at him. "Nice talking to you too Benjy." He gave her a slight wave and disappeared back into the compartment he must be sharing with his friends.

Without sparing the wannabe followers of her das, she turned and walked in the opposite direction of Narcissa and Lucius compartment in search of the candy trolley. By the scrambled footsteps she could tell they were in hot pursuit. The terror of what she could do to them nothing compared to what their parents or the Dark Lord himself would do if they didn't follow orders.

After tracking the lady down and buying chocolate frogs and sugar Quills, Hermione let herself be convinced to go back to her own cart.

The rest of the train trip was spent pretending she didn't see the trio (Rosier must have joined them at some point) 'randomly' walking by every 5 minutes, or the continued hushed argument between the older Slytherins who shared the compartment with her, while she nibbled on Sugar Quills and pretended to read a book.

She couldn't wait to escape to the Ravenclaw table and later the common room. Ordering the Sorting Hat to place her in that house was the smartest thing she ever did.

* * *

**Since the guest reviewer asked me what year Benjy Fenwick was in I thought I'd write the different years down so you would know;**

**Hermione Merope Riddle: 2nd year (Ravenclaw)**

**Evan Rosier: 2nd Year (Slytherin) **

**Avery (aka lanky) : 2nd year (Slytherin) **

**Mulciber (aka Shoulders or Muscles): 2nd year (Slytherin)**

**Narcissa (Cissa) Black: 5th year (prefect) (Slytherin) **

**Lucius Malfoy: 6th year (prefect) (Slytherin) **

**Benjamin (Benjy) Fenwick: 4th year (Gryffindor) **

**Bellatrix (Bella) Black and Rodulphus Lestrange are engaged but not married yet, and have both graduated before Hermione started attending. **

**Lorraine (Lorry): 1st year **

**Barty Crouch junior: 2nd year (Ravenclaw) **

**Regulus Black: 1st year (Slytherin) **

**Severus Snape: 2nd year (Slytherin)**

**Mauraders and Lily are 2nd years in Gryffindor **

**I try to follow Canon ages as much as possible. Bellatrix is the middle sister therefore she has graduated if Narcissa is a 5th year. I like to keep her close in age to Lucius and he was a prefect when Severus Snape began in Slytherin. Regulus Black is one year younger than Sirius and as well as every Black family member (except the Maurader) was sorted into Slytherin. The people I was completely unsure the age of, I took liberties. Barty was barely out of Hogwarts when he was sentenced and condemned by his own father (in 1981), but I decided I wanted him in Hermiones year, making him slightly older than in Canon. Anyone I forgot or you just wonder why I put them in that year, feel free to ask.**


	15. Friends?

**Miss me?**

**I'm back! My holiday was amazing, and now I return to dreary everyday life. Sort of kidding, but I miss meeting at least 5 exciting new people every day that surprise me. Some have been horrible, some have been amazing. **

**Reread the story to get back to the flow of it, realized a major mistake I needed to amend. Evan Rosier has blue eyes! His look is dark black hair, sparkling blue eyes, the way I imagined him from the beginning! Went back and amended it, on the other hand Benjy has green eyes and brown hair.**

**As always, thanks to purple breeze and AliceEnchanted for reviews! Special shout out to the Guest reviwer sending several "UPDATE " reviews, they made me smile and sped up me going back to writing. Also huge thanks to everyone who has started following or favoritism this story, you are all amazing! **

**Also, Halloween chapter will be up that is inspired by the great books and television series Goosebumps! So look forward to that. A bit of a shorter chapter but wanted to update quickly, so I'll try and write another chapter this week too! **

**Enjoy this chapter and leave me a review telling me what you thought, or general thoughts about life or what you did this summer, I love to hear from you and I'm curious about what kind of people read this story **

**Xxx**

* * *

**Friends?**

* * *

Lorry was sorted into Slytherin, to no one's surprise. So was Regulus Black, but the only one surprised was a very angry Gryffindor that looked a lot like him.

Other than that the welcoming feast was surprising to Hermione. Some of the new Ravenclaws had actually spoken to her, as the older years had yet to warn them away from her. She found herself speaking a lot to a very cute blue eyed blond girl that spent the entire time questioning Hermione about everything she could possibly think of asking.

Headache aside, Hermione loved talking to the girl because she had no qualms about speaking to her, even after hearing her name. A few of the others had also joined in to ask about classes and other stuff about Hogwarts, happy to find an older year that smiled and answered their questions readily.

Her smile faltered as Leanne 5th year and newly appointed prefect came over at the end of the feast. She smiled brightly at the new members of their house after sending a glare at Hermione.

"Hi Y'all! I'm Leanne Muster, I'm one of the Prefects in Ravenclaw. If y'all are done we can head on up to the tower and get you's settled in!"

"I'm done I guess." Blondie said, followed by the grumbles of the others meaning they were done too. "Hermione it was nice to meet you, I'm Emily."

Before Hermione could reach out and grasp her extended arm in greeting and friendship, Leanne pushed it down. "We'd better get going, chop chop." And dragged Emily after her while the rest of the firsties followed suite.

_Well that lasted long, _she thought.

Sighing she got up and started making her way up to the Ravenclaw tower after the firsties. There was no rush as the dorm had no password, only riddles. Unnoticed by her at first, four boys started following her. A fifth rushing to finish his meal and scramble after them.

She took her sweet time walking up, absentmindedly stepping over the trick step. Her pursuers doing the same, except for the last one. Unbeknowst to the others, this would prove very troublesome for him as four Gryffindors would be going up to their dorm. He saw it as a depressing foresight into his next six years at Hogwarts before he was free of his older brother at last.

The Gryffindors on the other hand saw this as a sign of great luck and many opportunities to come.

Hermione finally caught on that she was again under the watchful eyes of the Slytherins as she turned a corner and saw a flicker of green at the corner of her eye. Groaning she quickly escaped into an abandoned classroom to her left before they could spot her.

Leaning back against one of the many broken desks in the abandoned classroom she pondered when this would all be over. If at all this would stop, it most likely would be because of her transitioning into something else. Like for example, becoming a wife to one of the dumb dumbs her father thought so highly off.

As the shadows of her pursuers flickered through the slight crack in the door, she knew she was free for now. Problem was, she didn't know what to do with her freedom. She never really did think too much on what she could do if she was free, the pursuit of freedom being her only quest except for the quest for knowledge.

She moved into the corridor, taking a defensive stance for when her stalkers would return.

As the first one rounded the corner in a run, a simple tripping hex had him face down on the floor in no time. The four other following, landing in a heap on top of the blond headed idiot.

Four quick expelliarmus as they were falling over each other quickly had her gaining the upper hand, the blush on blondies face showing his embarrassment. Sonny boy looked a bit scared, while the henchmen looked about ready to murder her.

She put the wands in her robe pocket while she tapped her own against her lip. "No what to do with you..." when the henchmen moved, she quickly petrified both of them, their glower intensifying when they hit the ground again.

"Stay still, I wanna savour this moment." She murmured to them, her pride once again getting the best of her. She didn't notice that Lucius had collected his feet under himself. As he launched himself at her, She was too slow to react, and they both tumbled to the floor. The wands fell out of her pocket and clattered on the floor, landing out of reach from them both. Hermione had managed to wedge her wand between them somehow, and she yelled out to petrify him as well. But he covered her mouth when she was halfway through the spell.

Unlucky for him, Hermione had become quite accustomed to fighting like a muggles over the summer, her attempts to get away from the gruesome trio did leave her with some important lessons.

Her last thought before utilizing that knowledge was;

_Sorry Narcissa._

The groan as her knee connected with something soft told of her success, in the corner of her eye she could see The Son cringe as he crept closer to the abandoned wands. This time she managed to petrify Lucius as his hand had dropped away from her mouth. While she tried to wriggle away from under Lucius the son had managed to get a hold of one of the wands.

Both stood up, wands raised at each other, three pairs of eyes flicking back and forth between the two. Hermione smirked as he intoned with a trembling voice "Expelliarmus!"

A tiny fizzle and a groaning sound came from the wand, Hermione snickered as he looked at it in surprise and betrayal. "Petrificus totalus" and he joined the others on the floor.

After a few sticking charms Hermione made her way up to the dorm with a happy smile on her face, even knowing she had probably yet again lost a friend at Hogwarts because of Leanne couldn't stop her from smiling.

* * *

The next morning her smile returned as the population noticed that Slytherin had started the year off with negative points, a feat no one had thought possible. The disgruntled faces of 4 Slytherins sitting closest to the door, ready to bolt if need be told everyone who the culprits were.

After last night she was now sure Leanna had warned off the firsties as even they gave her a wide berth that morning. She had a wide space unoccupied around here as the rest of the house Sat almost on top of each other. Who knew the Ravenclaws were so dramatic?

"I guess you heard the good news?" A voice close to her startled her back into the present.

"Huh?" She was mortified by her ineloquent response when she saw the mirthful green eyes of Benjy staring back at her.

"The Slytherins are already behind." He smirked at her as he grabbed a plate and started buttering his muffin. "Why else are you smiling like that?"

She shook her head, wondering if she was perchance dreaming that the handsome Benjy Fenwick had sat down to spend his morning chatting with her.

He leaned in and whispered in her ear, making her blush and look over to the 4 angry Slytherins glaring daggers at her and the Gryffindor. "Maybe it's because you are the cause of losing said points?"

Her eyebrows shot up in surprise and she was quick to splitter out a "n-n-n-No! Of-f c-course not!" Breathing out heavy afterwards to collect herself before continuing "why would you think that?"

He smugly took a bite off his muffin as he replied, crumbs falling out of his mouth "I've seen you in action, and I know they never get in trouble if it isn't because of you."

She bit her lip, chewing nervously on it. "Shouldn't you be over there?" She motioned towards the Gryffindor table behind them.

He laughed "kicking me to the curb already?"

"No I was just-"

"Relax, I'm only yanking your wand."

She angrily drank some of her tea, glaring at him while he seemed to not notice it. An expression so feared by many others was weird to not have an effect on him. She was always thrown for a loop with this guy, he was so unlike any of the others.

"Besides, from the way they are staring over here." He nodded towards the guys. "I'd say they won't do anything to hurt me today. Any other day maybe, but if they lose more points the other Slytherins will burn them at the stake."

"But-" She breathed reply again, as he looked over at her curiously. "Why are you here?"

"We're friends remember?"

"Why do you wanna be friends with me?" Her question was meek, fearful and would have made most people want to hug her and rattle her hair to reassure her. That's what she read in books at least. But all he did was shrug take another bite of his muffin and say "haven't thought about it."

They continued eating and making small chit chat before class, only departing when he had potions in his first class, while Hermione had DADA.

* * *

As the weeks went by, she found that not only would Benjy occasionally talk to her, but Narcissa (after she had gotten over her kneeing her would be fiance in the balls) would exchange pleasantries as well. Cissa was forced conversation, while talking to Benjy meant she was a mess of nerves and insecurities.

Two lower year girls had taken to talking to her too. Turns out Emily was way too chatty and curious for some of the people her own year, they found her annoying and boring. They said that even for a Ravenclaw she studied too much. Hermione being starved for friends, didn't mind her chatty presence and constant questions.

The other first year was Lorry, who spent the entire time staring wistfully at "Evan Rosier" aka The Son who Hermione loathed so much. When she wasn't googly eyed over him, She spent hours going over how amazing he was because of so many things Hermione found vapid or unappealing. His name being brought up every 5 minutes was why she now knew his name.

Her Slytherin side did see the advantage of a friend like Lorry. Sometimes she could use her to escape Rosier for a while, pushing her into him making them both fall over was her favorite thing. Mostly because of the pleading look he sent her and the horror he clearly felt over being stuck with this insane giggling girl again.

Also Lorry, the big gossiper she was, knew everybody's name and secrets, but she was not smart enough to keep the information to herself, filling Hermiones head with so much possible blackmail material she had started keeping a journal to keep track of it.

A few weeks in she was surprised how often she found herself next to somebody that considered her a friend. Even if she didn't return the sentiment, it was nice to be popular.

Maybe this year wouldn't be so terrible after all.


	16. Storm Brewing

**All Hail the amazing Google! Recently discovered they have something called 'Google documents' which means I can write on any computer, laptop, ipad or phone with internet without having to deal with the pain of writing on Fanfictiondotnet. Which also means another chapter, yay!**

**Think of this as a present for being so patient and still following my story, even with the two month break!**

**Thanks to AliceEnchanted and purple breeze for the wonderful reviews. And thanks to anyone following this story, and the people who have put it on their favorites list.**

**YAY IT'S OCTOBER; HALLOWEEN IS ONLY 30 DAYS AWAY!**

**xxx**

* * *

**Storm Brewing**

* * *

Her circle of friends was not what one could consider the slightest bit normal.

Out of all of them, neither seemed to like the others, maybe it had something to do with house, maybe it was an age question for some, or maybe it was just who they were as a person.

For Hermione, this quality was a relief. Being used to only interacting with books and the ghost Moaning Myrtle, she was not accustomed to a lot of people around her actually making conversation.

Sadly Lorry decided to change that a couple of weeks in. In her own mind nothing would be better than them all sitting down together and doing homework.

Had it not been for her annoying crush on Rosier, and the way she exploited the whole 'body guard' situation, Hermione would have accused her of being a Hufflepuff.

"Isn't this cozy?"

Screw it, she was a damn Hufflepuff.

The grumbles from the henchmen told her they were just as displeased by the situation as Hermione was. Usually Hermione being fixed to one location, like the library, for hours meant they could either take shifts watching her, or go away for a couple of hours before returning to find her in the exact same spot. The only thing that usually moved in her library session, was the pile of books being moved from the "to read pile" to the "read" pile. Being forced to spend time with the "Ice Queen" and study made them very grumpy goblins.

Rosier looked like he wanted to murder Lorry, but the girl was oblivious to the look he sent her. The angry glare with the narrowed eyes made it hard for Hermione not to laugh. The boy had never even been that mad at her, and she made his life hell.

But Lorry did not have an ounce of insight, or feminine viles, something Cissa and Bella apparently had in bucketloads. Thankfully, her father being who he was and so against her dating, they had not made a remark on her own 'feminine viles'.

"Are you having fun Merry?" she smiled up at Hermione, who cut a grimace. Out of the corner of her eye she could see Rosier's lip twitching as he tried not to laugh at her sour expression.

As far as Hermione was concerned, they were all bloody bleeding hearts Hufflepuffs.

"Sure." She stared Rosier down, and noticed he gulped from the intensity of her gaze. "I was just thinking I need volunteers for some new spells I've found."

The intense staredown between the two was unnoticed by Lorry yet again, but the Henchmen shifted nervously in their seats.

Evan's eyes looked like the center of a storm, while Hermione's warm chocolate eyes turned almost red in her fiery rage. As Blue met Brown in a battle of where neither really understood what it truly was about, Lorry nervously chatted on. But the droning of her voice faded into the background with the noncommittal sounds of Shoulders and Lanky. As they tried to drag their 'leaders' out of whatever death stare competition they had, the two very similar teens dared each other to give in first.

It got awkward when they had not moved for several minutes. The three others at the tiny library table desperately trying to think of a way to get out and away without being punished in some way for it later. The new arrival made them snap out of the trance they had fallen into, but they did not relent in their staring.

"I thought you two hated each other?" Regulus Black was a brave man for entering into unknown territory. But then, he had grown up with a now infamous prankster that had defied his family more than Hermione had managed when she had decided on Ravenclaw. Sirius Black had the gall to chose Gryffindor over Slytherin, and the hat hadn't even hesitated in the decision.

"We do." they answered at the same time. Hermione narrowing her eyes with indignation over that fact, while Rosier lifted his eyebrows at the same time.

"Then why are you undressing each other with your eyes?"

That snapped them completely out of it, both heads turned so fast to face the little Black traitor so fast you wondered if their necks might be broken.

"What did you just say to me?" Hermione's tone made the two Henchmen get up and make remarks on how low the candle had gotten, and how they really must be going now, trying to drag Rosier away with them.

Lorry, unused to the dangers of angering Hermione, looked confused between the three boys making a hasty getaway (Rosier being more or less dragged by the other two while swearing profusely at Regulus), Hermione, and Regulus.

"I think he meant that it looks like you fancy Evan." Lorry supplied.

She turned and glared at the first year girl "I got that, thank you."

Regulus was creeping back slowly, realizing that he had really stepped in it. Before Hermione could turn back and face him to really yell at him Lorry cut in.

"You're welcome." she smiled that oblivious smile of hers, and Hermione decided to let the Black kid go for now, she had bigger, or at least more annoying, fish to fry.

"I was being sarcastic." she stood up, towering over the little girl. "What is it about you Lorry, that make you so incapable of understanding what is going on around you."

Her eyes looked sad, but before she could say anything, Hermione picked up her private books, stuffed them in her bag and left. She turned around and barked a command for the first time in her life.

"Make yourself useful and clean up after us." and with an upturned nose she left the Library earlier than any other day she had gone to it.

* * *

As she stormed down the corridors of Hogwarts, Hermione for once was free of her relentless pursuers. Her mind was too occupied to notice this fact though.

She already felt a little bit guilty for the harsh tone she used with Lorraine.

Groaning, she realised she had commanded the first year to do something. Previously she had made a vow to herself to not become anything like her dad, which had meant making a list of things she was never allowed to do. Very near the top of that list, was the vow to never command another fellow witch or wizard to do her bidding.

She blamed Regulus Black somehow. Maybe it was the anger of not being able to yell at him for his comment about her and the despicable Evan Rosier. Whatever the reason, she soon started planning elaborate schemes to get back at him.

Somehow her schemes distracted her from making her way back to the tower. She had somehow walked the school for hours, her side hurt from lugging around her heavy book bag for so long. And she had gotten herself lost somewhere down in the dungeons.

The maze of corridors by the Slytherin common room was why nobody ever tried to find the entrance to it. That and the fact that it was filled up with a bunch of slimy snakes waiting to bite your head of. Sometimes they literally wanted to rip you in two.

The thought made her shudder, and she looked around for any clues as to where she had gotten herself lost. Walking without looking ahead of herself she suddenly bumped into someone.

The ompf and carfuffle alerted her to somebody else being present, but she couldn't see anybody.

"Hello?"

She thought she heard a mutter of "you're the charmer!" and a "she is practically a snake!" but that could all be in her head.

"Where are you?"

Looking around herself, she still saw no signs of anybody, but the corridor was dark so maybe she wasn't looking properly. Then in the corner of her eye she saw movement and lo and behold, there was Sirius Black himself.

"Sorry about that." He flashed her a grin that Lorry had deemed 'dreamy' on one occasion, it had little effect on Hermione however.

"What are you doing down here Black?"

"I could ask you the same question Riddle."

They stared at each other, Sirius grey eyes reminding her a little of Evans, which made her shake her head.

"Since when does a Gryffindor walk into the snakepit?"

"Does a Ravenclaw fare much better?"

"This one does."

"Ah Yes, the Holiness of Hermione Merope Riddle, how could I forget?"

"I don't know, most Blacks know better than to speak to me like that."

And suddenly an idea clicked into her brain.

"Looking for your brother?"

He scoffed "What is it to you?"

She shrugged "Just so happens I have a bone to pick with him as well."

"Really? Your merry band of followers not living up to your standards."

"Don't call them that." her teeth were clenched, and she had to control herself from lunging herself at him. Everybody knew this Gryffindor rarely ventured out alone, his friends must be close by, and she wasn't about to let herself be overpowered like that.

"Why not, it's what they are isn't it?"

"Stop it Black, I am offering you a deal."

"What do I get out of it."

"A chance to prank your brother, I'll deliver him right to you."

"I can easily do that by myself."

"Without any other Slytherins protecting him? He is smarter than to meet you alone, you and I both know that."

"What do you get out of it?"

"Revenge without any ties to me."

"Sounds like a bad deal for me."

"And I'll make sure you have safe passage out of the Snakepit tonight."

"I don't need-" he was cut off as he heard the steps coming closer.

She raised her wand at him, getting close enough to let it dig into his esophagus. "Do we have a deal?"

"Hermione there you are! We have been looking everywhere-" Lucius stopped as he saw the Gryffindor she had at wandpoint.

"Black." was the entire greeting he offered the Gryffindor that suddenly found himself facing five more foes, one of them his very own brother. Regulus shifted nervously at the sight of him, guiltily looking away and avoiding his big brothers eyes.

Sirius growled in a low voice."Deal."

Putting her wand down she gave him a sickeningly sweet smile "good."

She turned around to address her stalkers "Boys, I've just made a deal with Mister Black here that he can go unharmed out of the snakepit."

"We made no such deal."

"If you promise not to harm him and follow him out of her with us, I will make you a deal."

In the voice Hermione had started to call his *impression of her dad* he said "I'm listening"

"I'll give you one week of no grief. I'll let you follow me around, I won't hex you and I won't try to escape you."

"No deal-" Rosier started to say, but Hermione's eyes bored into him.

"I promise, this is the best deal anyone has ever gotten with me. Just ask your parents." She raised an eyebrow at them, and they all looked to Lucius who raised an eyebrow himself.

"You have yourself a deal Miss Riddle."

And with the shake of a hand, Hermione found herself for the first time at Hogwarts, truly embracing her Slytherin side.


	17. Skittish Creatures

**Sorry this took forever, after my Eurotrip I was worried I'd get bored so I made sure to fill up my days, which was surprisingly easy, even without money. I've done volunteer work, regular work, trained, started learning German, spent a lot of time with family, worked on my resume, reorganized my room and bored you all with this long ass sentence!**

**Thanks for the amazing support on this story! I am 2 followers away from 100! Thank you to every single one of you, you are all amazing! I am also close to 10.000 views! **

**Special thanks to AliceEnchanted, purple breeze and ****Terrasen for your wonderful reviews! **

**Xxx**

* * *

**Skittish Creatures**

* * *

She kept her promise of course, to the complete surprise of her stalkers.

The first day they were extremely jumpy.

They reminded her off baby goats, jumping every 5 seconds like there was some extreme need for it. It made her antsy, and unlike the baby goats, they weren't cute and tiny harmless things, so she retired early that day lest she break her promise.

Evan had noticed his need to stay in the know that day. People saw him as the quiet inattentive type, but truth was he liked staying back to see the bigger picture. Which was why he was so angered that he couldn't see Hermiones endgame in this.

This not knowing had him on edge, and he took it out on his friends, telling them to keep a closer watch on her, asking them what she was doing etc. They seemed as on edge as him and found his request easy to do, since it kept them slightly more busy.

They all cringed at times when he shifted in her seat at the library, or when they were a step behind her around a corner. The attack they all were expecting seemed to be hanging over them, much like a bucket full of water she used to put over a door.

Lucius was so tense he would have snapped in two had he been a string on a piano. The poor guy ended up having to go to the nurse by the end of the day. He had a nervous breakdown and Narcissa had insisted.

* * *

On the second day they kept looking at her funny.

Evan was so calculating, like she was a puzzle to solve, and the answer would come to him if he stared at it long enough. But it seemed that none of the pieces fit together, because every now and then he would frown and shake his head.

Avery looked extremely bored, and kept sending her looks like he wanted her to do something, to prove him right. But she never even arched her eyebrow in response.

Mulciber looked confused, not in a wanting to solve her kind of way like Evan, just plain old idiotic. He kept scratching his head, today she was reminded of a Gorilla watching over her for more reason than just muscles.

Black just kept looking at everyone in the group, wondering why a chick studying warranted so much emotion.

Lucius looked normal for the most part, well if you could ignore the way his left eye twitched in a disturbing way. Apparently his trip to the hospital wing had not helped, as he had to return again that evening.

Narcissa had lingered around Hermione. Amusingly enough there was nothing she could say. Previously she had complained about her incessant hexing, was she supposed to ask her to curse him now so he could calm down? By the pacing behind the nearest bookshelf, Hermione gathered she very much wanted too.

* * *

On the third day they kept extra watch on her.

She would swear it was the entire Slytherin house. And a glance behind her shoulder often confirmed that she wasn't paranoid in thinking so.

The inner circle of followers were almost on top of her they were so close to her whatever she did. She ended up spending way too much time in the bathroom because they couldn't follow her into it.

Halfway through the day they started going in after her, even though they all hated Myrtle. So she locked herself in one of the stalls. If they dared follow her in there she would hex them, promise and plans be damned.

* * *

On the fourth day she got a letter from her father commanding her brilliant attitude towards the boys. This resulted in them walking on eggshells waiting for the bomb to go off.

Sudden movements had them grasping each other and forming a wall for comfort.

They hunched down, making themselves tiny like mice when she walked towards them.

If she turned around when walking in front of them, they would jump faster than geckos to hug the wall. She was forever caught between laughing at their antics and rolling her eyes.

Even breathing too heavy had them clutching the nearest surface and closing their eyes waiting for the onslaught of hexes they were sure would follow.

* * *

On the fifth day only Evan Rosier seemed suspicious. Lucius seemed relieved, and spent most of his time away from the group, sure they could handle whatever she threw at them.

Hermione suspected part of the reason he left had to do with how much time he spent in the hospital wing. Watching over her when nothing happened seemed to have him close to losing his mind.

Evans blue eyes seemed to haunt her that day though. She kept seeing them out of the corner of her eye, never showing emotion.

Sometimes she would stare back, and try to figure out what it was he was thinking, but apart from suspicion there was no clear emotion in his impossible blue eyes.

* * *

On the 6th day she tested them when they were in smaller groups, walking off but telling them where she was going, and by the end of the day they had grown accustomed to it, letting her walk with only one of the boys following her sometimes.

It's nice when plans come so easily together.

* * *

On the seventh day the boys seemed to be determined to enjoy the nice weather and the last relaxing day without the stress of Hermione hexing them at every turn or escaping them in some way.

Hermione had grown very tired of their presence, but relished in the fact that they had so easily been lulled into a false sense of security.

This was when she made her move.

She woke up early. To the horror of the boys, they had to wake up early as well. Taking a stroll around the grounds the boys had no way of just lying down and falling asleep.

After that she made her way up to the library, and piled a huge stacks of books up as high as she could without tipping it. Sitting down surrounded by several such stacks, the boys yawned.

Regulus, Avery and Mulciber all looked like they wanted to murder her, but way too tired to do anything of the sort. Lucius and Rosier had decided that being the self proclaimed leaders of the gang meant they could sleep in. With her promise to them they knew the extra hours of sleep would be fine.

"Are you gonna be long?" Shoulders was always the brave and stupid one.

She motioned to the books "what do you think?" And continued flipping through the book she had picked from the first pile.

The henchmen had a whispered conversation, and as she had predicted, they left Regulus alone with her, sneaking out like she couldn't see them leaving. They of course made Black promise not to tell the two others of what they were about to do.

Now she just had to wait for him to be sleepy. People always seem more amenable when tired.

It took almost an hour before she saw him about to fall asleep. She stood up Making the kid scramble up, clearly woken up just as he was falling asleep. It seemed a difficult feat for him to stay on his feet.

"I'm going to the toilet."

"Uh yeah lead the way "

Hiding her smirk she led him down some corridors until she came to the second story girls bathroom.

"Aren't you coming?" He was hesitant, like he could get cooties or something. "Promise I won't do anything to you."

Seeing her sincerity he followed her into the bathroom, only to be attacked by the foursome waiting there.

"Riddle."

"Black."

"I see you made good on your agreement."

She smirked at him "I always keep my word."

She turned to leave but looked behind her at Regulus now held down by the one with glasses and the nerdy one "You really should watch what you say around me Regulus Black. Next time I won't let you get off this easy."

She pulled out a wand when he struggled against his captors, his eyes widening in fear as she pointed it at him. "Petrificus totalis."

She waved at the boys as she walked out. "Bye boys. Pleasure doing business with you."

She returned to the library, and continued working through her pile of books until Evan showed up later.

He instantly looked around expecting to see someone watching over her, but of course found no one. He sighed and dragged his hand down his face in exasperation. "I knew it was too good to be true."

"Whatever do you mean?" Her tone was mocking, daring even and it angered him just as she had hoped it would.

"What did you do to Regulus Black Hermione?"

"He's not here?" She looked up and around like she was actually trying to find him. "Huh"

He banged his hands on the table, startling her "Don't play games with me. This whole week was about getting revenge on him wasn't it?"

She smirked at him "Revenge for what?"

"He never got yelled at for what he said, and no hexes either. I thought he had gotten off lightly. But you were just waiting for the right opportunity."

"Think of it as initiation."

"Damn it Hermione, where is he?"

"I honestly have no idea."

"What do you mean?"

"Sometimes you find opportunities to delegate certain tasks to other people."

"I am not some stupid Ravenclaw who loves riddles, so stop your games and tell me right now!"

"Or what?!"

"Or I'll tell your father."

"Really?"

"Yes"

"Since when has that threat ever worked on me?" She scoffed "and what are you going to say, Hermione got mad at Regulus because he insinuated there was something between us?"

He paused, seemingly getting where she was going with this.

"We both know who gets in trouble then. So why don't you be a clever little snake and figure out this yourself. I thought you all were supposed to be good at this type of thing."

He sneered at her, something she found hilarious, but since she had no one else guarding her, He couldn't leave her be just yet. His duties as 'body guard' came before rescuing his friend.

You could always count on Slytherins to put themselves first.


	18. Weightless

**_Thanks to everyone for the 101 followers! You rock! _**

**Special thanks to purple breeze, AliceEnchanted and ****KahargaAmira for the lovely reviews! **

**I know I said this chapter was going to be goosebumps but then Hermione was a bit vengeful and this happened! **

**Next Chapter coming on Halloween titled Goosebumps! **

**Xx**

* * *

**Weightless**

* * *

When he first heard what his daughter had done he was furious.

The idiot messenger hadn't had the common sense to run away from him. Most people knew by now that Voldemort was a huge fan of torturing the messenger, the other followers had scuttled away from the lad the second they heard the name Hermione.

The guy was still twitching on the floor when Voldemort started laughing a maniacal laugh.

It seemed no matter what emblem was on her chest, she was a Slytherin to the core.

He snapped his fingers and got pen and paper. At this point nobody knew if it was the quickness of his followers or his own magic that got him it so quickly, but nobody dared ask.

After jotting down a small note he folded it neatly, wrote something on the back of it and dropped it on top of the guy moaning on the floor.

As quickly as it had appeared, the quill vanished. And Voldemort strolled out of the room. As the door slammed His followers gathered around and helped their fallen comrade to his feet. The first person who had picked up the letter trembled in fear and dropped it again.

"What is wrong?"

The guy just pointed towards the letter where an elegant swirl of their fearsome leaders handwriting had written down his daughter's name.

* * *

Hermione was having a good morning, her stalkers were back to their insane level of paranoia, Lucius had stopped needing to go to the hospital wing and her "friend" Lorry had emerged from the shadows she had crawled into when Hermione had yelled at her.

She still didn't like the girl, but it was sort of nice how everything was back to normal.

During the school day she had just sent simple tripping hexes and other low annoyance spells towards her pursuers, she was still planning how to get back at them for a week of annoying her.

After a normal day, the boys felt confident that the worst was over. But the sight of an owl flying in towards Hermione had them all fearing for the worst.

The letter simply said;

**How Slytherin of you.**

But no one managed to read it as she immediately set it on fire, and accidentally half of the table. Most ravenclaws at the table simply lifted their books out of the flames calmly, the upper years competing over who took out most of the flames in the most creative way.

Screw planning, there was hell to pay now.

The next day had the Slytherins being extremely mad at a foursome of Gryffindors that usually pulled this sort of prank. The funny thing was the people who had this done to them, they were all a part of a more elite group in Slytherin, one that meant most would never dare lay a hand on them. One of them had after all endured a particular nasty prank two days prior, so it seemed odd they would target him again so soon.

Peeves of course was thrilled, and made the entire thing even worse by antagonizing the poor fellows.

When the Gryffindors that was supposedly guilty of doing the deed entered the great hall, they fell over laughing. A reaction like most of the others that entered the room (excluding the teacher of course who were desperately trying to fix everything.)

The only one that seemed unperturbed by the whole thing was Hermione Riddle. She sat quietly by the table, nibbling on a toast and reading a book like she would most days.

She would duck to the side whenever one of the boys in question floated too close, like she could sense wherever they were and didn't need to look away to avoid being hit.

It seemed the 5 boys that usually followed Hermione around somehow were floating around the ceiling of the great hall. It was like they were in space, weightless and uncontrollably drifting through the big room.

The teachers had a hard time finding the counter course, and with their trajectories being hard to determine, it was hard to hit them with any spells.

The boys were all still in their PJs, some of them sleeping throughout the ruckus of people laughing at them and trying to get them down.

Lucius Malfoy was awake, somehow looking like an elegant vampire with the way he floated through the air. He had crossed his arms over his chest, not giving in to the need to try and control his movement like the only other one that was awake, Avery.

Avery had his limbs everywhere, flailing to try and move downwards, but so far the only thing he had managed was making himself spin around and around. He had gotten up to quite a speed before he decided it was pointless and just spread his arms and legs to stop from spinning. Now he was just a huge floating starfish.

Evan looked a bit like a cherub while he was sleeping, or a cuddly teddy bear. Hermione kept those thoughts to herself though, but found it oddly peaceful to glance at him every now and then.

Speaking of teddy bears, Regulus was clutching his pretty tightly in his sleep. Clearly the baby in the group, the sort of ridicule that would follow him for this made Hermione feel slightly ashamed of herself. She could have left the teddy bear down in the dungeons, but Regulus had been so fuzzy to manage without it, and he had looked so sad.

The last of the group, Mulciber, was snoring pretty loudly, and twisting in ways that made his shirt ride up and display his pretty impressive physique for someone his age. Apparently the whole thing made more girls admire him then tease him, backfiring on Hermione in a surprising twist.

Peeves broke the peace of Evans slumber by spinning around him to get a bigger speed than Avery had managed earlier, and then he screamed in his ear waking him up while his whole world was spinning between sky, great hall and flock of students laughing.

"I WILL GET YOU FOR THIS HERMIONE!" was the first thing that came out of his mouth, and she had a hard time not breaking down in laughter at how quickly he went from angelic to demonic.

Dumbledore walked into the hall at that time, everyone turning towards him. He looked up, a slight twitch on the side of his mouth the only reaction he had before he waved his wand and the boys all floated down too and on the floor and tables.

Regulus, the poor guy, landed in the middle of some porridge on the Gryffindor table, right in front of his brother. He just couldn't seem to catch a break, waking up to a bunch of Gryffindors laughing at him as he was clutching his teddy bear, covered in porridge. McGonogall exclaiming "oh dear" in sympathy, and rushing over to assist him.

Avery landed behind the teacher's table. Cursing by the harsh landing, earning him detention from Professor Sprout.

Lucius managed to land gracefully by the Slytherin table, like he had rehearsed landing after being weightless before. Pretending nothing at all was out of the ordinary, he nodded in greeting to his peers and started eating his breakfast. Not bothering to care that he was still in his black silk pyjamas.

Mulciber landed on the ground near a group of Hufflepuff girls that were way too happy to help him. The squeals coming from both Mulciber and the girls in question saying they were a little too eager while waking him up.

Evan landed on a heap on the floor thanks to Peeves making him spin so much. He immediately got to his feet, anger burning in his eyes, and headed straight for Hermione.

Stomping like a four year old he got there quickly, but instead of yelling he just breathed heavily, too mad for words. Hermione didn't even turn around.

"Why did you do this to us?!"

Hermione cast a quick look at him over her book, out of the corner of her eye, and then returned to reading. "What makes you think was me?"

"Stop playing dumb, we all know you did this!"

In a very calm voice, but still not looking at him in his adorable PJs Hermione returned with "Prove it."

"Oh believe me princess, I will!"

She smirked but did not start arguing any more, knowing self preservation would win over his thirst for revenge, like it always did.

* * *

And as predicted everything returned to normal pretty quickly, except for the fact that Rosier had stopped following her around. She was down to 4 again.

One down she was alone studying with Lorry the girl was staring at her for some reason.

"What?" Hermione said with a sigh.

"You scare me sometimes." she said in a very even honest tone of voice.

Hermione raised an eyebrow at her "Only sometimes?"

Lorry shuddered and went quiet.

After a while she stared at her again. "yes?"

"I miss Evan."

Hermione rolled her eyes "you would."

"can't you apologize?"

"what for?"

"for what you did to him, to all of them."

She put down her quill that she was writing with and stared at Lorry. "No, I meant what good would that do?"

"He'd come back."

"I want him gone, him and the rest of the lot."

"I'm sure you don't mean that."

"Of course I do."

"They're just trying to protect you."

"I neither want nor need their protection."

"Please can't you just-"

She slammed her book shut, making Lorry jump at the sudden noise "You don't get it Lorry, and I don't think you ever will." The Slytherin looked hurt up at the Ravenclaw.

"I just wanna spend more time with Evan, is that so wrong."

"Well then go spend time with him, see if I care!" with a flourish of her wand her things were packed in her bag and she left the library, pretending like she couldn't feel the tears pressuring to fall down her face.


	19. Goosebumps

**I know I said I'd update Halloween, but this chapter turned out way longer then I expected, so I had to cut it in two. Then this part was better than the other part to name Goosebumps (Second part named Samhain up this Saturday).**

**Thanks to my lovely reviewers purple breeze, kmb3 and lalyta8! And thanks to**** all the people who have followed and favorites this story! You are all amazing.**

**Xx**

* * *

**Goosebumps **

* * *

Hermione had been in a horrible mood all week. Evan should be glad, no scratch that he shouldn't care at all. But for some reason his eyes always drifted over to her in the classes they shared.

She looked sad when she didn't think anybody was watching, and angry when she knew they were.

When their eyes met one sunny afternoon they both stared at each other for a long time. The brown in her eyes seemed to dull, too dead to be hers, and the red in them told him she had been crying. He had seen her like that often over the summer, usually because of him. Guilt gripped him for a second.

* * *

Hermione didn't know why it felt so nice to have him paying attention to her again. But when their eyes met she forgot about what was troubling her for a moment.

When he sneered at her, she was reminded again though. She turned back towards the teacher, heart aching.

Lorry had just confirmed how everyone felt, the only reason to be around her was so you could gain favour with someone else.

Lorry had seemed different for a while, but the only thing separating her from the others was that the person she was interested in was not her father, but her body guard.

Evan. Now with him gone she didn't have to delude herself anymore and believe that she had a friend in Lorry.

* * *

She found herself alone at the library.

Without Evan it seemed the standards of her stalkers were lacking, only with Lucius around could she be assured she was "protected" But she wasn't complaining.

It was very surprising to see a flash of red and gold trimmings in her periphery vision before someone sat down across from her. Glancing over her book she found the smirking face of Benjy Fenwick.

"Done ignoring me are you?" it was more of a statement then a question. Since she didn't look up from her book she missed how Benjy frowned at her.

"What's got your knickers in a twist?"

"I haven't seen you around in ages."

"You've been surrounded by a wall of Slytherins. I wasn't going to start fighting with them."

"So much for being a brave Gryffindor." she snarkily replied, knowing where to hit home to really insult him.

"And you wonder why I stayed away." it was the first time the light hearted Benjy had ever come across as angry towards her.

"Well you are all about self preservation, just like the other Slytherins." she stared at him now, his green eyes that she always tried to sneak a peak at no longer sparkling with mischief. Now they were sharp and glinting with anger.

"I don't need this. I came over here to talk to a friend but I guess that person went away when she started hanging out with snakes."

He raised himself up and started to storm away.

In his angry retreat he almost missed the soft whispered words "They're the only ones that will have me…"

He stopped, but when he turned to look at her she was gone, leaving her books behind in her usual neatly stacked piles.

Guilt tore at his heart, but then he remembered her harsh words and got angry again. If she was going to be like this, he didn't have the time for her.

* * *

Suddenly it was like first year again. She would avoid the boys, hexing them or make them get in trouble. But her heart wasn't in it. Somehow seeing Regulus Black in the place of Evan Rosier made her sad as well.

She was again friendless, and the curiosity of Benjy's gaze that had followed her half a year before, was now turned to an angry frown, if she saw him at all.

She had taken to reading outside, leaning against a tree near the lake. The changing of the season had brought a lot of colors to the trees, like fire consuming the world.

Sitting with a good book, bringing a cup of steaming tea (under a stasis charm) and being in the large open space brought a calmness to her.

Somehow being somewhere waste like this all alone, made her feel less alone.

Having finished she spotted Hagrid near the forest, walking over to his cabin. She vanished the cup and book up to her tower and walked over to him. It had been a long time since they'd talked.

"Hey Hagrid, what are you up to?"

"Hermione! I- uh. I didn't see ya there. Everything alright?" he moved to hide something behind his frame, successful in hiding it yes, subtle, no.

"Yeah sure- What's that?" she pointed to what he was hiding. His eyebrows rose high up, surprised by his inability to hide it from her.

"Nothing for you to worry about!"

"Is it from the forest?"

"Now don't you go poking your head in there! You have no business in the forest. I forbid you from going in there."

"You can't forbid me from doing anything Hagrid." her anger rising to high levels, she was never good with being told what to do. "You're not a teacher! You're not even allowed to carry a wand!" she clapped her hands over her mouth, surprising herself with the sudden outburst.

By the look on Hagrids face she had again hit a sore point. "how do ya know about that?!"

"Hagrid I'm sorry I didn't mean-"

"Just stay away from the forest!" the otherwise gentle half giant snapped. Then he quickly entered his cabin, slamming the door and locking it before Hermione could even entertain the idea of following him.

Seemed like the only thing Hermione was good at, was making enemies out of friends.

* * *

The question of the forest haunted Hermione for the next few days. She didn't want to anger Hagrid even more by going against him.

But he had never been bothered by her going into the forest before, so why now?

After rereading the same sentence around 13 times because she couldn't concentrate, Hermione decided she had to do something.

And it wasn't like she had ever been caught before right?

She decided to escape her guards during the feast. People seemed to be distracted by such trivial festivities. Hermione had never seen parties as anything but boring, but few echoed her thoughts when it came to that.

* * *

"Evan, we need your help."

He sighed looking up at his two best friends. They didn't spend nearly the same amount of time together anymore since he had opted out of being Hermiones little plaything for any longer. He figured he could gain the Dark Lords favor another way later. His father would strongly disagree if he ever found out.

"What?"

"It's Hermione."

"Then go bother Malfoy or something." Evan was happy down in the dungeon, this was usually the place they went to escape her craziness, they even had a rule not to mention her name after stepping into the common room.

"We need your help finding her." Malfoy said from the other side.

Evans response was banging his head on the table, and mutter out a strangled "why me?"

"She sidestepped us before the feast. We figured she had gone ahead before us, but she still hasn't turned up." Avery fretted, eyes darting around like the walls had ears and eyes, like the Dark Lord would find out how they failed him.

"And?"

"And what?" Mulciber asked, looking extremely confused.

"Why is this different than before?"

"We asked one of her classmates, Barney or something, and he said Hermione never showed up for the feast." Avery continued.

Evan sort of envied her for that. Except for the increase in food, he didn't really see how it differed from any other dinner at Hogwarts. Except for how disgustingly cheery and phony everyone became. Feasts and parties were things he did everything he could to get out of.

"We've searched the castle, she is nowhere to be found. Eventually we got desperate enough to ask Moaning Myrtle if she knew anything." Malfoy drawled, disgust evident from having to talk to Hermione most hated accomplish.

"Get to the point already."

"She's gone into the forest." Mulciber said, horror lacing his words.

"So? She's done it a thousand times before, we get in trouble, she comes out without a scratch."

"We really need to state the obvious?" Evan looked up at Malfoy, confused as to why he was so passive aggressive. "It's Samhain."

It took him a while to understand what they were saying, then he thought back to his bedtime stories as a child. "I'll get my coat."

* * *

It had been easy to get out, too easy she thought. She didn't know if she was getting better, or they were getting worse. She was intercepted by an unusually cheery Myrtle on her way out. They exchanged pleasantries, Hermione in a bout of unusual honesty admitting where she was taking her stroll. Leaving the ghost hurriedly, so she wouldn't be caught, she missed Myrtle calling out after her, saying they might be together forever come midnight.

It was still bright out, the sky turning red as the sun was devoured behind the horizon, making way for the moon and stars as night befell.

Usually she would have to somehow get around Hagrid to get to the forest, but he was up at the feast like every other breathing soul at Hogwarts.

At first she thought the forest was more quiet, more secretive than usual. The birds that usually chirped on the outskirts and random intervals throughout the forest were absent. The only sound was her breathing, the crunchy leaves underfoot, and the occasional branch she would break on her walk.

She hadn't decided where she was going that night, maybe to see the thestrals? Curiosity had lead her into the forest, but going through it she had no idea where to start looking for clues to what Hagrid was hiding.

Her thought were broken as she heard a twig snap behind her. She turned around, trying to see through the darkness. The last rays of light disappeared, and the moon hung above her. The day changed too quickly she thought, and then she heard the wolf howling in the distance.

* * *

"How are we supposed to find her?" Mulciber snapped as he was once again hit in the face by a branch. The guy was not used to the woods, he had lived a spoiled life never setting foot in a green setting besides the Slytherins quarters and his mother's garden.

Avery fell face down for the millionth time, groaning and mirroring Mulcibers disgruntled mood. "Yeah, we've been walking for an hour! Can't we just give up? I'm sure she'll be fine!"

Lucius rolled his eyes at their behaviour, but didn't deem their questions worthy of a response.

"You dragged me into this remember? Now shut up, I'm trying to listen for sounds of life." Evan responded instead.

Avery hoisted himself up, Mulciber helping him. Then they both lost footing falling in a heap and loudly declaring their pain "Ow!" "Get off me!" "You get off me!" "you're on top of me you idiot!" "don't call me idiot idiot!"

"Boys" Lucius grumbled, shutting them up to Evans pleasure.

"What's that?" Regulus asked, pointing into the darkness.

At first it seemed like nothing, but then they all saw the eyes staring at them through the darkness.

"wands out." Evan whispered.

All of them whipped out their wands and trained them on the single set of eyes in front of them.

They didn't move, but silence seemed to stretch out, like it wanted to smother them with its overbearing presence.

"Lucius!"

"Shut up Regulus."

"But-"

"Sh!"

"Evan…"

"Stop your whimpering Avery!" he shout whispered back.

"We're surrounded." Mulciber said in an even voice, the boys spreading out in a circle to discover he was indeed right.

"Fuck." Malfoy swore, the rest of the boys too freaked out to comment on the abnormality of him swearing.

* * *

She had run away from where she had heard the branch breaking. And in her escape, she had gotten lost for the first time ever since she had begun taking refuge in the Forbidden Forest.

After walking for a while she had come across a Unicorn who had almost run her over as it darted through the forest. Whatever it was running from it was afraid, she had seen the fear in its eyes as it bumped into her. The usually serene animal looked wild as it desperately moved off into the distance.

She continued walking, hoping she would eventually come across somewhere familiar, even if the shadows of the night, and light of the moon made everything strange and unfamiliar.

Later she almost stumbled into a clearing with a group of Centaurs, and they looked afraid too. She had broken a branch while she hugged a tree to stay out of sight. And instead of charging at her like they normally would, they looked towards her in fear, and disappeared.

She continued walking, the chill of Autumn creeping up on her, making her cold. Shivering and getting uneasy and afraid by how strange the forest was on this night, she wasn't careful where she was stepping.

Suddenly the ground opened up and she fell down. She cried out in surprise, her hands moving to grasp at something to hold her up. Anything to manage to keep her from the pit that threatened to swallow her.

But she fell, and fell and fell. It feel like ages before she crashed on the floor of what must be a cave or something. She tried to gasp, but her lungs were not cooperating as her breath had been knocked out.

She was spread out, unable to breathe, unable to move, suspended in a moment of terror. She looked around, but all she could see was darkness, the moon overhead too far away to cast light down into the pit she was in.

Help she tried to cry out, but she was still not breathing, and no sound came out. The moment of being suspended, almost like she was outside her own body, ended. But instead of bringing breath and relief, it brought pain. Spreading out and consuming her limbs.

Before darkness overtook her, she tried to call out for help again. No sound came from her, but overhead she heard the wolf howling one last time before the world was black.

* * *

They must have been fighting the spiders for well over an hour. Somehow they had found a semblance of a routine together, which managed to hold the beasts at bay. But they were growing tired, and they weren't sure of they could keep up with the attacks they were delving out.

They had somehow moved further into the forest. The further they got, the more spiders disappeared, seemingly unwilling to continue their pursuit as they moved out of their territory.

When they all of a sudden seemed to run off, the boys were relieved, too tired at first too look into why the spiders took off.

"Guys?" Regulus said. They all looked at him, and again he pointed into the darkness behind them.

As they turned and looked where he pointed Avery muttered "You are never allowed to point again."

* * *

Hermione woke up, gasping, relieved to find her lungs working again. Logically she knew they must have been working for a while, or else she would be dead.

Moving she discovered her body in even more pain than before. With little choice if she wanted to get out alive, she stood up with great difficulty. She moved around to see if there was a way out.

The hole seemed to be a narrow round tunnel going straight down, stopping where she landed. It wasn't narrow enough for her to climb by using both sides. The sides were too slippery and straight too be able to climb it using only one side. Wracking her brain for solutions she couldn't come up with a single spell to help her. If she had someone at the top she could easily conjure a rope to help her climb.

That was if she didn't include her broken ankle in the plan. Thinking she had nothing to lose she yelled out for help, her voice finally doing like she wanted it too.

After a while of calling out she heard movement.

"Thank Merlin you're here! I'm stuck please help me!" She called out as she heard the person coming close to her.

The growling and the glowing red eyes had her yelping and hugging the opposite wall of her pit. Her breathing was going faster, heart beating against her ribcage as fear gripped her. Then the creature was joined by several others, circling around the edges of her prison.

* * *

Somehow they had managed to escape the big thing following them. Neither of the boys were sure what it was, only that they were happy to escape it. They continued moving through the forest, now truly lost they decided that trying to find Hermione made as much sense as finding Hogwarts. The first of the two they managed would be fine, after the night they had, disappointing the Dark Lord didn't seem as terrifying.

Then they spotted what looked like wolves circling something, the noise the boys made barely drawing their attention. The others made to walk in the opposite direction, but Evan stopped as he was sure someone called out his name.

"Did you hear that?" he asked, moving closer to the predators to the others discomfort.

"What are you talking about?" Regulus who was usually so observant answered.

"Come on Evan, it is probably just a rabbit or something." Avery said, looking at the flock nervously.

"They are right, we should continue." Malfoy said in a drawl, fixing his clothes up that were still flawless even through all they had endured that night.

But he didn't listen to them, moving ever closer. Some of the beasts growling at him, but he sent sparks at them, scaring them backwards. As they moved back, growling at him and snapping at his feet, he saw the hole in the ground.

"Help!" he heard the strangled cry from the hole. He moved closer and found the familiar brown orbs staring up at him.

"Hermione?" he had completely forgotten about the boys or the angry hungry beast surrounding him. As he saw her lying in a pit defenseless his mind and his heart were conflicted.

He had been so angry at her after her cruel prank, and the situation she was in now was something straight out of his revenge daydreams.

Brown pleading eyes and her meek melodic voice whispering his name as she stared up at him had him forgetting about that though. His lips parted in surprise when she said "Thank Merlin it's you." like he was the answer to her prayers.

* * *

Hermione stared up at Evan, her heart leaping in joy. Without much thought she said "Thank Merlin it's you."

She might have been thinking about Benjy swooping in and rescuing her seconds before. But had she been completely honest with herself Evan was the person she had hoped would rescue her all along. He was familiar and safe in a way the Gryffindor wasn't yet.

For the first time in what felt like weeks, Evans blue eyes weren't cruel and unwelcoming. They sparkled with compassion like she had never seen directed at her before.

Soon the other boys had scared away the beasts. Lucius being the one most talented and trained with spells managed to get Hermione out of the pit pretty quickly.

"Thank you." she whispered, looking down at the mossy ground.

"Sorry, didn't quite catch that." Evan said, and when she looked up at him to give him an earful, she found his eyes mischievous and sparkling. She couldn't be mad at that, and she was happy they had rescued her after all "Thank you." she said again, to the surprise of all the other boys. Evan just kept her gaze, smiling like they shared some secret.

It unnerved her.

"We better get back." Malfoy said in his usual drawl, but as they made to move they heard the first _Gong_ of the clocks at Hogwarts, ringing out over the quiet of the forest.

_Gong_

The boys held their breath. Hermione stared at them.

_Gong_

"What's wrong?" she asked.

_Gong_

"Midnight." Regulus said.

_Gong_

"So?" she questioned.

_Gong_

"It's Samhain" Avery and Mulciber said in unison.

_Gong_

"and?" She sighed, tired of their dramatics.

_Gong_

"You've heard the bedtime stories." Malfoy said, his voice breaking slightly.

_Gong_

"No?" she said, and the boys all stared at her in surprise.

_Gong_

"Does Voldemort strike you as a bedtime story kind of guy?" Hermione said.

_Gong_

"I guess not." Lucius answered for all of them.

_Gong_

"Bedtime stories aren't real." she scoffed.

"I guess we'll find out soon enough princess." Evan said, their eyes meeting once again in the dark.

_Gong_

Suddenly the previously eerily quiet forest was filled with growling, howling and the sound of things moving closer.


	20. Samhain

_Happy Belated Halloween to you all!_

**I'm so sorry! I was supposed to post this yesterday, but didn't have the time to finish it and I didnt want to post something half assed. Extra long chapter to make it up to you though. **

**During the course of the next few days I'll post a oneshot with the mauraders, A new chapter of "Allure of Darkness" and "Opposing forces of Nature" along with a two shot on Hermione/James Potter. They were all supposed to be up on Halloween, but this cold is killing me! UGH!**

**PS: How was everyones Halloween?**

**Xx**

* * *

**Samhain**

* * *

The boys turned to form a circle. All with their wands drawn.

"Hermione?" she turned and looked at Evan, disbelief shining through her eyes at the sound of his trembling voice.

"Yes?" she replied timidly.

"Get in the middle, don't make a fuss."

Usually she would have done the opposite, but she was afraid, and for once she tried to trust that her dad had more in mind than loyalty when he had decided on her bodyguards.

The howling and growling continued, but they couldn't see a thing, all of them tense, and jumping at the slightest sound.

"We should move." she said, voice a whisper like she was afraid the creatures in the darkness could hear her, the boys tensed a bit, like the idea of movement put them more at risk. "If we stay it's not a question of if, but when."

Lucius and Evan exchanged glances, silently debating with each other the risk of staying versus going. Eventually they nodded to each other and told the boys to start moving.

At first they tried moving in the circle they were staying, but it proved difficult. Evan took to the back, Lucius to the front, the boys spread around Hermione, but now all facing forward. For a while nothing happened, the darkness was still around them, the light from the moon shining through at irregular intervals. The sounds of the forest was all around them, closing in, moving around, having them on high alert. Sometimes it felt like they were being circled by whatever was out there, sometimes it seemed like they were being watched. It all boiled down to them being prey, and whatever was out there was hunting them down, waiting to devour them, hurt them, terrorize them.

Suddenly the horrible sounds they had heard stopped, leaving the forest eerily quiet. The sense of relief at first was replaced by fear.

"_Why did they stop_?" Mulcibers voice echoed Hermiones thoughts as she thought them. At first she had thought the voice had been all in her mind, and that she just somehow used her "frightened voice" as Mulciber.

They had so dearly wished for the noises to stop, but the noises let them know where the monsters where. Hermione had stopped thinking about them as animals in the forest, and admitted they could be something more ominous. Whatever was out there, it wasn't cuddly puppies and bunnies, thats for sure.

They stopped again, wands pointing outwards, but instead of monsters emerging from the shadows, they just saw fog creeping in. It filled the forest ground, making it impossible to see where they were stepping. Only when it reached their hips did it stop, the forest still just as quiet. The fog filled up all they could see of the forest, moving towards them, and past them, fast. It was like watching clouds on a windy day, it just seemed to fly across the sky. Instead it was fog, clouding up the forest and filling them with fear.

They were all too afraid to move, or talk, afraid that anything would bring something charging at them. Tense and quiet, the moon lighted up the fog, making it blue in an otherwise black world.

A CRACK like stepping on a branch broke the quiet, and they all tensed even more, Regulus actually screamed.

"Sorry." Avery mumbled, guilty of breaking said branch, and they all looked at him like they were going to kill him. Hermione couldn't help but let out an amused snort. When she made eye contact with Evan who looked like he was about to piss himself, it turned into a full out laugh.

The others soon followed suit, the tense situation becoming unbearable enough that they had to let it out somehow. And the out of place laughter helped loosen up the group.

Regulus squaked "It's not funny!" Humiliated by screaming like he did.

The others continued laughing, even stone faced Lucius "It's sort of funny."

"Whatever." Regulus grumbled.

"We should keep moving." Evan said when they had all calmed down, except for the pissed off Regulus. "The faster we get back home, the better."

Silence was broken by the crunching of leaves and branches under their feet. They all stayed quiet however, thinking that there is such a thing as tempting fate.

They must have been walking for an hour, or at least it felt like it, when the trees changed. It was like they were moving around to keep them there.

"Are the trees moving?" Hermione said, keeping close to Evan because she stepped back, unwilling to go closer to the dark trees without leaves. They were bare, high and dark, like a picture in a horror book for children. Skeletal was the word Hermione would have used to describe it, the branches reaching outwards like they were grasping for something or someone.

"Don't be silly, trees don't move." Avery said, but then he uttered a soft "Shit." when one on his side seemed to move.

Then all of the trees at the same time started to make gurgling noises.

The boys stepped closer to Hermione to protect her. She wasn't going to protest, even if part of her wanted to let them know that she was a better dueller than any of them, and that they really didn't need to protect her.

For the first time that night, Hermione screamed.

The trees were bleeding. Thick heavy blood, all flowing like somebody had cut gashes in them. The blood moved down the trunks, covering them so they were only blood red. It almost sounded like water running, but since it was thicker it had an element to it that was indescribable. Hermione had goosebumps , her hair standing on edge, as the sound filled the silence. Then it was broken up by a steady drip drop from the blood that collected on the branches and started dripping from it. The blood moved under the fog towards where they were standing. The moonlight hitting the trees since they had no cover, turned the fog red. As the blood filled up, and moved closer, the fog got more and more dark, until it too was blood red. The blood on the ground filled up around their feet, they could feel it soaking their shoes as they stood there looking for a way out.

"What do we do?" Hermione asked, looking to every one of them for support or ideas. She wasn't sure, she just knew she wanted to get away. From this place, from these trees, from the creatures in the dark waiting to get at them.

They turned to each other, all whispering to each other and themselves, too afraid of the blood and what it could mean. None could be heard over the other, all too afraid to make sense or to get out of their heads and realise they needed to keep a cool head.

For how does one fight trees? It wasn't exactly on top of the DADA curriculum.

Suddenly the moon got stronger, and they looked up at it through the blood red branches bleeding. When they heard the howl that sounded different than anything they had heard before, they got quiet. "What was that?" Regulus whispered, barely audible.

"Werewolf." Lucius said, in a tone that meant he knew. Hermione looked at him and thought she saw the rest of his hope vanishing. He had turned ashen, and his body seemed to stop moving, like the connection between mind and body had been cut and he was left suspended there.

"Lucius!" Hermione shouted at him, trying to wave her hand in front of his face. Save for his trembling lip you could believe that he was dead. The other boys seemed to panic even more, looking around for an escape with panic in their eyes. It wouldn't be long before their group would descend into panic, and they would scatter in craze and all become victims of whatever was in the dark.

"Snap out of it!" she smacked Lucius, to all of their horror. "We need you Lucius, don't fall apart now."

He stared at her, the moment tense until they heard the howl again, this time accompanied by several others. Then Lucius gave her a slight nod, and they moved again, blasting away one of the trees to get away.

But before they could escape from the clearing, Mulciber tripped and fell. "Mulciber!" Avery called out, trying to grasp his hand to help stop the fall.

A sickening sound between a snap and a crack alerted them to how badly it was. The cry of pain following it was something that would follow them all and haunt them later on. Evan and Avery moved to help him up, Lucius helping look at his leg.

Hermione stared in horror at Mulciber. He was covered in blood from the trees, it was so much it was dripping from him, like it was his own blood. His eyes had become red from the blood as well, some of it having been rubbed into his eyes when he tried to scrub the blood away to see.

If this was her first time meeting Mulciber, she would have sworn he was a bloodthirsty killer. And then he smiled, like he was trying to help lift her mood, but it had the opposite effect. She knew it would be very hard to not imagine Mulciber like this afterwards, knowing some of what her fathers followers did.

They were all so focused on Mulciber, that none of them noticed Regulus slipping away.

"Where's Regulus?" Evan asked, looking to Hermione like she had somehow vanished him. It was almost impossible to spot him since he had such a head start. Hermione had the common sense to use a point me spell which revealed his direction.

And in the same moment she berated herself for not using it earlier to try and get back to the castle.

"We have to find him!" Hermione said, but the boys all looked like they wanted to abandon him. Ashamed for them, Hermione just took of in his direction, not caring if they followed. She didn't move fast on her wounded leg, and the boys soon caught up with her even though they were mostly carrying Mulciber.

"Hermione." Lucius tried.

"I will fight you if you try to stop me." she said, shaking his hand off her shoulder.

He wisely stayed quiet and continued moving in his direction.

They found Regulus in the middle of a clearing, and he wasn't alone.

Four hags held him captive, snickering in high pitched squeals that made all of them cringe. It was uncommon for Hags to travel together like this, and it made it hard for them to fight them. They were standing around a fire, preparing it to cook Regulus it seemed. Hermione was deathly afraid that they had been too late when she saw Regulus unconscious body between the Hags.

The Hogwarts students put Mulciber against a tree so he could help fire spells from afar. Avery being the quickest of them, ran around to the other side of the clearing to get them from behind.

Then Evan, Lucius and Hermione charged at the hags, Hermione and Lucius taking out one hag each, while Evan moved quickly to the middle, and tried to get Regulus back. Avery jumped out of the trees behind the hags, screaming, making the hags turn, and he got one. The last one, seeing all her friends vanquished screamed at them, and charged at Hermione, the tiniest in size of all of them.

Regulus was still unconscious, Evan trying with everything he had to get him back to consciousness. Mulciber fired a spell at the Hag that was still standing, and narrowly missed her as she connected with Hermione, making them both tumble to the ground.

Hermione pushed against her foe, scratching, kicking and doing everything she could think of to get her off. But the Hag was heavy, and she cackled at her feeble attempts, her hands around Hermione's throat.

The hag took her head and banged it against the forest floor, Hermione's vision clouding. She couldn't see the hag at all, just the hands that were choking the life out of her. She made a desperate sound, trying to alert the boys of what was happening.

The boys could no longer see the Hags, not even the one choking Hermione, they were all hidden underneath the fog, too far away from the fire to light them up and make them visible. When the boys took a relieved breath because Regulus woke up, they relaxed too much, and made too much noise.

One hag had crept up to Mulciber, the boy having a difficult time fighting her off with a broken leg. Two hags had attacked Lucius, seeing him as the strongest of the group. Evan had enough difficulty holding Regulus up as he was slowly coming to.

Mulciber managed to get the Hag with a diffindo, cutting off her arm. She screamed, foul breath overpowering him for a moment. Then the hag ran off, and they were left with three, two tearing at Lucius. Avery ran up to him, trying to drag one of them off.

Hermione was close to losing consciousness while the boys were fighting. With a final last effort, she poked the hag in the eye with her wand, piercing through to the socket. It made a squelching noise when she did it, the hag screaming in pain, and then she muttered reducto, her throat sore from being suffocated. The head of the hag blew up with her spell, shooting in a million direction with an odd sound of flesh being ripped apart from within.

Avery had managed to get the hag off, and he, along with Evan and Mulciber, fired spells at the Hag. All of them missed, but the Hag knew better than to fight a losing battle after having lost two of her foes already, and bolted.

Then the boys all together took care of the last hag, fighting her off, until the stupid thing managed to step into her own bonfire, and take fire. Hermione noticed the Hag running off screaming, as her burning figure ran past Hermione who was still trying to breathe properly on the ground.

After a bit of boosting between the guys, and congratulating each other on how amazing they all surely were, the noticed her missing.

"Hermione!" Evan called out.

"Here." she croaked, coughing after straining her throat.

They barely heard her but managed to find her.

"Good to see you're alright." Mulciber grunted, the nicest thing he had ever said to her actually.

"No thanks to any of you. Bodyguards my ass."

"Hey, I distinctly remember you calling out from help after being stuck in a ditch." Evan said.

"Seems like I would have been safer in a ditch." she mumbled, and then started coughing again to her annoyance.

"It was your idea to go running after Regulus!" Avery protested.

"Unlike you I didn't want to leave him behind!" She screamed, and coughed even more, almost covering up with Regulus said.

"You were just going to abandon me?" he said meekly, the boys not responding.

"We should have left you behind." Evan said in anger to Hermione.

Hermione's eyes were blazing with fury. "Fine, I don't need you."

"Fine." Evan said, Avery and Lucius trying to protest, knowing Hermione walking off was a bad idea for all of them.

Before they could stop her, she disappeared into the fog, walking away from the boys without another thought. She regretted it, knowing she was safer with them, she didn't even know what she could end up facing in this forest.

The fog was still omnipresent. The moon was hanging overhead, and sometime during the fight with the Hags, the sounds of it had started up again.

Howling

Growling

Movement

Wind

Leaves rustling

Branches snapping

It overwhelmed her, made her consider turning around again to find the boys. They brought her a small semblance of security, she had to admit. She still didn't understand why her dad would put Selfish boy Slytherins to watch over her. It would have been smarter to put brave Gryffindors, or maybe loyal Hufflepuffs. Someone that actually had something more in them pushing them to protect her.

Sometimes she spotted movement, or glowing eyes.

But she just kept moving, keeping an eye in the direction of where she had seen it, but she experienced that most of whatever was in the forest, they didn't care enough to go after her. Maybe she wasn't interesting enough to be attacked or eaten. Or maybe they were just biding their time, waiting to see when she was not on her guard, so they could take her down then.

She soon ran across a group of Thestrals, the horse like creatures walking over to her and licking her boots. Seemed like they were happy to help get rid of the awful blood from the trees. She petted them, not caring about their reputation, she had read enough to know that they weren't actually dangerous.

Maybe I could ride them to get back? She thought. But before she could move to do anything of the sort, they stood up straight, and looked behind them into the darkness. The silence was tense, and Hermione stared at the same spot they were.

Then without warning, they took of flying, leaving Hermione behind, possibly facing whatever had scared them so.

Then she heard the hooves on the ground, moving closer and closer, coming straight towards her. Suddenly the Centaur came out of the shadows, he raised himself on his hind leg, making a noise between animal and madman, like a battle cry. His front hooves were kicking in the air, his arms tensed to the side as he shouted.

He turned his eyes on Hermione, and she could see that they had gone completely black. After the little display of strength, he went down on all four legs, and walked slowly towards Hermione.

"Centaurs don't hurt children." she said, voice breaking after the assault on her esophagus and her fear shining through. With the darkness in the centaurs eyes, she was unsure if he was sane, or if something had happened.

When he only smirked in response, towering over her, Hermione knew it was gone, this was not normal. "Please don't" she said, wielding her wand in front of her, trying to scare it off with her wand. Like a centaur would ever be anything but offended by the sight of one, they never thought of Humans as a threat.

"Can you admit to needing help now?" Evan suddenly said to her left. When their eyes met, she made a slight inclination of her head, like she would admit to that, and he smirked in response.

They must have followed her, she was surprised that she hadn't heard them. But just happening to run across her at the best possible moment seemed unlikely.

Hermione and the boys turned to the Centaur charging against them, wands up.

"Don't hurt it!" Hermione shouted, sending a simple stunner at the magnificent creature.

"Kill or be killed" Mulciber said, and the conviction in his eyes scared Hermione when she looked into them,

"Something did this to him, we need to just stun him, so he can be taken care of by his tribe!"

When she threatened to disarm them if they did it any harm, they finally listened. It took a while to stun it, their stunners not strong enough for his big mass.

When he was finally taken down, other Centaurs moved around them in a circle.

"Wands down." Hermione commanded when she saw that their eyes were normal.

The leader of their group stared into Hermione's eyes, sizing her up. And then with a slight inclination of its head, like Hermione had done towards Evan earlier, the peace was confirmed. The boys all lowered their wands, but did not put them away.

"Young foals." the leader said. "You should not be in the forest tonight. There are many dangers lurking in the forest on Samhain."

"We are trying to get out, but can't seem to escape the clutches of the forest." Hermione responded.

"We will escort you out, as a thank you for not hurting one of our pack."

"Will he be alright?" Hermione blurted out, and was rewarded by a smile."

"What is your name foal?" he asked.

"Hermione." she responded, sure that her last name would make them turn away from her. It was well known that Centaurs read the stars. Hermione saw it as utter bullshit to be able to predict the future, but Centaurs were scary accurate.

"My name is Firenze, a pleasure meeting you."

She smiled at him, and he inclined his hand to motion her forwards. They moved through the forest in silence, the pack protecting them. She didn't see or hear as many things as she had when she was walking on her own. The overbearing noise of the forest around them had been replaced by the sound of hoofs against the forest ground. It was interlaced with their own footsteps, the steady beat of it all having a calming effect on them all after the trouble they had been through.

It didn't take them long to get out of the forest with the packs help. When they could see Hogwarts through the trees, the Centaurs stopped for a second, then all but Firenze moved back into the forest.

"Young foals we bid you farewell." Then he turned to Hermione and gave her a slight bow which she returned. Then he joined the rest of his herd waiting for him in the darkness behind the trees.

Left on their own, but free of the dangers of the forest, they all moved back into Hogwarts, Hermione and Mulciber brought to the hospital wing by the others. All of them ended up getting a thorough checkup by the nurse after they woken her up. They hadn't meant to, but Avery had managed to send several bedpans and various other instruments to the floor and made an insane amount of noise, startling her out of her sleep.

Then they were all forced to drink a bunch of potions and sleep over in the hospital wing. Evan, and Avery were the only ones without major injuries, but the Nurse was too tired to deal with them at the moment, opting to look after them more carefully in the morning. They also needed rest, and with everything they had seen, they weren't saying no to a Dreamless Potion that she passed their way.

Lucius needed some stuff looked after, but he was fed a Blood Replenishing Potion, a Dreamless Potion, and a Pain Potion. Hermione had a couple of spells done to her to fix her leg, and then got a Dreamless and Pain Potion. Mulciber had his bones removed completely to be on the safe side, before he got a Pain Potion, a Potion to Regrow Bones, and a Dreamless Potion. She couldn't seem to determine what the Hags had done to Regulus, so she just fed him some Dreamless Potion and Pain Potion and left it at that until she could talk to a colleague in the morning.

She was all out of Calming Draughts, but assured them she would get some in the morning. Finally able to stop fearing for their life, the 6 students fell sound asleep.


	21. Surprises

**so sorry for the wait, this chapter was hard, where exactly does one interrupt a fictional conversation? **

**I've recently read "The Debt of Time" And reviewed like 8 of the chapters because they stood out to me, I hope you do the same when you find something that moves you. It is what keeps us writers going after all. And like one of my reviewers (tneha) will notice if they kept going with this story after their review on a previous chapter, it pays off! I present to you, more of our dearest father!**

**Also if you enjoy my writing, there is a poll on my page where you can vote for what pairing I am going to do when I finish this one! **

**Thanks for the faves follows and to my lovely reviewers: ****Slytherin Princess34, purple breeze and tneha you rock! **

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**Surprises**

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Hermione woke, feeling content for some reason. Or maybe safe was the better word, maybe it was being home at Hogwarts after the dreadful night she had that made her feel good. She felt a little bit like she was on a cloud. Maybe she still felt the effects of the Pain Relief potion, or maybe it was just sleeping without having any strange dreams.

"Wake up."

That killed the mood. Cloud no more, now it was a hard hospital bed in a drafty room with too much ambient noise. How did the hospital wing have noise, wasn't that only in muggle hospitals where they had something called Machines? She was told they made a lot of noise.

Her dad's voice had cut through her illusions, clear as day, but frosty like winter. It couldn't be a hallucination could it?

"I won't have you lazing about." he continued, and even with her eyes closed, she knew he was boring a hole in her skull, impatient as ever. No this was not a hallucination, it was her sad reality.

"Dad." she greeted as she sat up, rubbing the sleep out of her eye. She stretched her legs, then winced in pain. One night was not enough to get healed fully.

He furrowed his brows by her greeting, then got really angry when he saw she was in pain.

"Where is that stupid nurse." he muttered, holding his wand up, and flicking his wrist so the sheets over her leg pulled up. He surveyed the damage, narrowing his eyes at her when she tried to cover up again.

"Really _Voldemort,_ like your specialty is healing magic." she snorted, his only response to that was flicking his wrist again, covering her up.

They stayed in tense silence for a while, Hermione wishing she was anywhere else than there. No scratch that, she wanted him gone, she didn't really care about being in the hospital wing. Even with the cold draft and the uncomfortable bed, she would have stayed there forever to avoid the company she was in.

"Don't say my name like that." he finally growled, his body went stiff for a moment, anger radiating off him.

She rolled her eyes at him. "I can't call you dad, father or anything that would remind people we're related. I can't call you Tom." he winced at that name. "and not Voldemort either."

"People should fear that name, not say it mockingly." he protested, though he seemed doubtful and less tense.

"Why make up a name when you don't want anyone to use it?"

"We're not discussing this again." she rolled her eyes. "You can call me 'Lord' like my followers do."

"I'm not some idiot masochistic male with self esteem issues, so I'm gonna pass."

"My followers are not idiots!" he barked at her, rising from the chair he had been so casually seated in up until then. Completely ignoring the other part of her statement Hermione noted. Even if he didn't think his followers were idiots, he certainly didn't have high opinions of them. She wondered if they knew, but guessing by their average IQ she would venture they didn't.

She just gave him a leveled stare, daring him to come up with any evidence to the contrary. But he didn't budge, neither of them did. Inheriting her dad's stubbornness had paid off when it came to confrontations with him. As a child it had been the most frustrating thing for him about her. Well except for dirty diapers.

The tense silence was broken by the curtains around the bed being parted and the nurse coming through. She was staring down at a clipboard that Hermione saw no purpose in, but maybe the woman needed notes to treat patients. Even just to administer the potions clearly labeled by her bedside table, even specifying when and in what order they should be in. With all the info on them, what could she possibly need the clipboard for?

"Good morning Miss Riddle, how are you-" she looked up and caught sight of her dad and started. "Oh my! I didn't see you there sir. And who might you be?" she batted her eyelids at him, the tone in her voice going from cold, casual and all business, to become a sort of purr that made Hermione want to gag. Hermione looked over to see her dad's face again being morphed into his charming facade. Seemed like everyone in the world had gotten the memo of becoming someone completely different around her dad. She didn't mind too much because her dad would usually make sure to not include her in anything. Most of their conversations were one on one, maybe to not be seen as weak since he couldn't bully her like he did his followers.

"I'm Tom Riddle." he always clenched his jaw slightly when he said that. "Hermione's dad." another jaw clench and tightening in the corner of his mouth.

"Charmed." the nurse said when he took her hand and kissed the back of it. She giggled, and Hermione rolled her eyes. Most kids were embarrassed for their parents when they flirted, Hermione was embarrassed for everyone that fell prey to his charm. It was like watching birds flying into the mouth of a crocodile to clean its teeth.

"You must be the talented nurse who has been taking care of my dear Hermione." his voice was sickeningly sweet, Hermione gagged slightly for real this time. Then she muttered under her breath how a minute earlier he had been all about how incompetent she was. Honesty had never been his strong suit.

The nurse didn't catch on, too enamoured by her pap to notice Hermione was even in the room any more. She was glad he had given up sex after the 'disastrous event that ended up sticking him with her' as he so lovingly called it. It meant that even though women flung themselves at him, and he also couldn't be bothered acknowledging her presence, she didn't have to watch anything gross.

He sent her a glare to warn her though, but she just made a gesture as if to say "really?!" and he just smirked at her.

Not bothering to pay attention to the bad flirting and being somewhat used to it, Hermione did as she always would in situations like these. She reached for her book.

For a while she got to enjoy her peace and quiet again. She was used to blocking out noises, her father wasn't fond of silencing charms, and his followers always seemed to scream a lot. Incessant flirting in front of her was a mild disturbance when it came to noise.

When the nurse finally and reluctantly left to check on her other patients, forgetting that she hadn't checked her, Voldemort seemed mad. She was too caught up in her book to notice until he grabbed it and flung it on the floor.

"I was reading that." she crossed her arms, angry that it always was on his terms. The curtain was drawn shut again, the potions she was supposed to take sitting untouched next to her on the dresser.

"You will explain what you were doing out in the woods." he was in her face, glaring at her again. Towering over her as she was confined to a bed, he was always taller, but Hermione usually stood proud and tall with her tiny body. From a hospital bed it was hard to give off the same level of indifference and return his glare with equal force.

But she wasn't about to back down or take any of his shit. "Taking a walk."

"Don't use that tone with me missy!" his volume raised, and she wondered if he ever put up silencing charms in situations like these. So public, so easily walked in on, showing her dad in something other than a favourable light.

"Tone? Missy?! Why don't you cut to the chase, why are you really here dad?" She had other things to do than cater to his flimsy moods.

"When one's daughter takes casual strolls through dangerous woods on Halloween, her dad starts to worry." daughter and dad now? He was clearly trying to either get a rise out of her, or appeal to her empathy. Neither of which would work.

"The things in that forest is less dangerous than the creatures you bring home. Dementors and Werewolfs? I remember having tea parties with snakes when I was a kid!" and then there was the Death Eaters, Giants, Acrumantulas, Inferi and other creatures she couldn't be bothering to bring up. Seeing as the two she mentioned was the ones generally feared by the wizarding world, she felt she didn't need to include the entire list.

"You command snakes. They would never hurt you." his tone showed how ridiculous he thought she was being by even suggesting it was dangerous.

"Maybe I don't have a great sense of what is dangerous anymore because my dad lets me spend time with dangerous creatures, but thinks making friends might ruin me forever."

"Friends? Slytherins don't have friends, only allies or servants."

"I'm not a Slytherin!"

"A tattered old hat was manipulated into putting you in another house." he scoffed, and sent her a look that spoke volumes. "You were born a Slytherin!"

"I am NOT a Slytherin!"

"Then why do you act like one?"

"I thought my actions were the ones in question here? Or did you want me to act more like a Slytherin? Really _Dad, _make up your mind. Should I disregard the rules, and your rules more like a true Slytherin? Or should I be a law abiding little goody two shoes like those Gryffindors you loathe so much?"

"You should do as I say!"

"Then make up your mind about what you want me to do!"

"I have! You need to follow my orders and do as your protectors say!"

"The ones that want me to spend all my time playing Quidditch, a sport you hate, or do nothing at all?"

"They know better than that."

"They don't. They are _children!_"

"Like you."

"Yes like me, they make up their own mind about what they want to do."

"They follow orders."

"Like good little Slytherins?"

"Yes!"

"Most of your followers are Slytherins. Are they all so good at following orders?"

That stopped him for a bit, she had a point there. He wasn't stopping though, whatever point he had come to make was about to be yelled at her by a red faced dark Lord.

Before he could, he was cut off by a calm voice "Miss Riddle how are you feeling?" the enraged father daughter duo whipped their heads around to look at the intruder.

To Hermione's surprise, her father blanched. He almost seemed to shrink a little bit, something most would not have noticed. He actually stood up straighter, raising his head and puffing out his chest slightly. Something in him seemed to want to run though.

Hermione was still cursing with adrenalin from the fight, her thoughts racing to process what was happening. Was she really seeing her father afraid?

The only way she recognized the signs was by the subtle way they reminded her of his followers. But her father had never seemed afraid a day in his life, but Dumbledore had an effect on him.

"I'm fine." Hermione remembered that he had asked her a question, only ten percent of her mind focused on it though. Everything else was focusing on her dad, and her headmaster. She kept looking at her dad, trying to figure out if she was really seeing this. Then she would glance at Dumbledore to figure out what the wizard with the ridiculous robes could possible have done to be imposing to a man that made the most powerful wizards in Britain bow and kiss his robes.

"Tom. How nice to see you." nothing about his tone seemed to relay what he was saying. The usual merry look on the old man's face was absent. Instead was this poker face, that was trying to mask something else… disappointment? Who could be disappointed in her father though.

She might not like the man that had fathered her, but the rest of the world looked at him like a God. It was strange seeing someone who wasn't bending over and presenting themselves to him in offering.

"Dumbledore." he spat out, his teeth grinding against each other and shooting shivers down her spine. These two were not friends. All pointed to them being the worst of enemies. He was darkness and fear, exuding from his pores was pure evil, everything in you screaming when you looked at him that he must be dangerous. Dumbledore emanated light and stood as a beacon with his half moon spectacles and brightly colored robes that drew everyone's gaze. Dumbledore was inviting in a way that made you relax, while her dad was charming in a way that put you on edge trying to appease him. Even Hermione tried on occasion to get praise from the Dark Lord, hoping for approval from her very own father.

The tense passing between the two men seemed to last a lifetime. Hermione was almost afraid to breathe and garner the attention of either of the powerful wizards.

In the end it was Voldemort that ended the uncomfortable moment. He looked at her and said "you are here to learn, not to make friends." he spat and then turned and left.

She was silently fuming, not bothering to look at the man that would only glance at her with sadness and disappointment. It was the same as the man that had just walked out of the room, except where Voldemorts held anger and resentment, this man showed pity. Hermione hated the way they both looked at her, miserable old men that would never understand the troubles of a teenage girl.

"Miss Riddle?" she looked up at him, and saw that look again. "I hope you know that there are better men in this world then the likes of your father and your friends."

"I don't have friends contrary to my dad's beliefs. Sir" she crossed her arms over her chest, annoyed at the headmaster. "He made sure of that."

"Then perhaps it is reasonable to seek a way to get out from his thumb Miss Riddle?" his eyes held more emotion than earlier, but he was gauging her response, waiting for some sort of sign.

She felt the intrusion in her head but didn't need to put up any barriers, her dad had tried that trick too many times so her walls were always up. Not acknowledging the surprise in his eyes, maybe because she didn't see it as such, she pushed on against him "To be put under yours headmaster?" she scoffed "I think I'll stick to the devil I know, _thank you."_

"The Devil? Is that how you see your dad?" he inquired, maybe hoping for some proof to hang onto her old man so he would go to Azkaban. A futile attempt from a pretty clueless man.

"I'm a teenage girl, that's how we all see our dad." she responded without pause, making sure the headmaster knew she wouldn't be so easily goaded.

He chuckled, her eyes narrowing and glinting dangerously at him. Maybe her situation amused him, or maybe he saw her as a pawn, either way she was done with him for today.

"Now if you'll excuse me, I need my rest."

With a merry twinkle and a "Get well soon." he was out of the curtains and Hermione could drink her potions and rest. She hoped the rest of the day didn't bring any more unwelcome surprises.

The day went on to be quite boring. Besides rest and reading a few books nothing happened besides taking more potions. It was all in all a rather boring predictable way.

When she finally left the infirmary, and one of the Slytherins followed her, she didn't feel the need to hex him. It wasn't until she was safely in the Ravenclaw common room that she realised she hadn't cared that much about the boy following her. She hadn't even bothered to figure out which one of them It was.

That was perhaps an even bigger surprise than the mysterious headmaster who didn't trust her dad.


	22. Desperate to Connect

**Started a Twitter account under the same name. If you want to check on my progress of either or all of my stories, what I'm writing, what I'm reading, what inspires me, or you start missing my long authors notes, I recommend checking there. ****Also I just posted a new(or old as it was written maybe two years ago) one shot with Tomoine, so go check that out if you're interested.**

**Tried a lot of new stuff in this chapter. **

**Thanks to all my lovely followers and to everyone who has put this story in their favorites! And thanks to my lovely reviewers; AliceEnchanted, purple breeze and Slytherin Princess34. You are all amazing!**

**Xx**

* * *

**Desperate to Connect**

* * *

Hermione didn't bother much with her bodyguards for a while after that. She figured she owed them for saving her life, but she wasn't about to admit it to their faces.

The boys wasn't about to shoot a gift horse in the mouth, and didn't say anything about it either, and life was peaceful.

It was the nicest either party had ever been to the other in years. And somehow her father's "congratulations" in his letter didn't even kill the mood. The boys had held their breath when they saw the owl carrying the letter. That owl could have been white as snow and they still would have seen it as a dark omen when they knew it came from Voldemort.

Not hexing the boys meant she had next to no human interaction as she had yet to apologize to any of her friends. Any potential friends were scared of by her wall of intimidating books, or wall of bodyguards. Most people had settled into friend groups anyway and weren't interested in expanding to welcome "the weird Slytherin."

She hated being called a Slytherin.

She wondered if a sign on her forehead stating "I'm a Ravenclaw!" would do no good either, she already wore blue and bronze robes.

People were idiots.

Desperate for companionship, she had started hanging out with Myrtle again. A decision resulting in her using drying charms daily. All the moisture meant her hair was worse than ever. She wondered if eventually it would go full afro. Would she be able to pull it off or should she just opt for a strong glamour charm? She touched her hair in contemplation, trying to calculate how long before she would have to decide what path to go down on. Both had merit, but just going with it seemed like the better of the two. It wasn't like people weren't afraid of her already, they would never dare say anything about her hair. And it wasn't like having horrid hair would mean less friends. Actually if it did, that might explain her friendless state.

"Hermione thank Merlin you're here." broken from her pathetic thoughts, she looked up to find Emily had joined her again.

The girl had left with Lorry, the two being closer than Hermione had been with either at any given point. Lorry had her Slytherin friends of course, so Emily had tried to befriend other Ravenclaws in Hermione's absence. A venture that proved dangerous it seemed if she was to judge by the state of the first year.

"Emily? How did you get past my guards?"

"Well I was just about to-" She started, like she was about to begin an epic tale, then she shook her head, realizing what Hermione had said "Guards? Since when do you call them that?"

Hermione shrugged, not bothered that she for once hadn't insulted them "Halloween I guess." Maybe this peaceful state meant she could actually be nice to the lads.

"So no more; stalkers, henchmen, snakes, idiots, annoying prats, _Slytherins" _the last one was said in a mocking tone, and she breathed in deeply to be able to keep going "wannabes, ugly puppies, slithering shadows, goblins, golems, trolls-"

Hermione cut her off with a hand on top of hers "Emily?"

"yes?"

"You were telling me how you got here."

"Oh!" she paused, trying to think "well in your absence I have been committing myself to higher learning and getting more friends this year."

"Alright." Hermione wanted her to get to the point already, annoyed with the girls prattling. At the same time she had to fight a smile, she had a friend again! Even if it only was for a few seconds, it was enough to stop her from being desperate enough to start being friendly towards her guards.

"Well…. Turns out, only one of those things is actually achievable."Emily's face fell, telling Hermione even more then her words did. She looked broken, like she almost wanted to give up. She was probably berating herself for even trying, that's what Hermione would do in her situation.

"Oh Emily I'm sorry." Hermione knew the feeling too well. Except she had her bodyguards to blame, there really wasn't anything she could do to dissuade people of the notions they had arrived at in her time at Hogwarts. Her wall saw to that.

"It's alright." Emily seemed to want to convince herself more than Hermione though. "I've missed you." She gave a sad smile to Hermione, and she could see a glimmer of doubt in her eyes, like she was afraid Hermione might not take her back.

Hermione couldn't help but give a genuine smile at last "I missed you too."

For the rest of the day, both Ravenclaws tried to let the other one know everything that had been going on since they last spoke. They attracted the ire of the librarian several times, but they were hardly sorry about it. Eventually the old dustball threw them out, muttering all the way, while Hermione and Emily continued chatting.

Again Hermione forgot about her shadows, and it wasn't until she retreated to bed, far beyond her normal hours, that she realized they hadn't done any work that day.

Maybe the hat had put her in the wrong house, maybe she should have been in Hufflepuff.

The thought was enough to keep her smiling until she fell asleep.

* * *

The next day the two girls walked down to breakfast together, talking the whole time. Hermione was happy to note that they still didn't have the need to resort to talking about school. It was a rarity for Hermione to talk about anything but school.

When the subject about her bodyguards again came up, she had to resort to talk about classes. No matter what, the subject of Halloween seemed too odd, and somehow a bit special, like it was a matter best kept between her and them.

After some days enjoying the company of Emily, Lorry came up.

The girl was still sore, and mad, at Hermione for what had happened.

To make matters worse, Hermione wasn't sorry.

She had noticed her around lately, but she had no misconceptions about what Lorry's intentions were. Experience and the way she stared at Rosier was indication enough.

Rosier had grown wary of the looks. The buffer that Hermione's presence had once offered after their fight, had diminished. Over the months following the fight, Lorry had slowly circled closer, like a shark in water.

After Halloween, the peace between Hermione and the boys often came up in the Slytherin dorms. The boys was adamant that the peace needed to be kept at all cost, no matter what other things they had to suffer through. All eyes had fallen on Rosier when that came up, and he knew what they meant. Lorry could annoy him as much as she wanted, he was not going to move to close to Hermione.

Before Halloween he could just move closer to Hermione to get rid of the girl. Hermione's temper was well known, and few dared try themselves against her arsenal of spells. Her space in the library was a safe haven for her, but for everyone else it was the one place they never went. When you added the burly guys watching over the entrance to the place, people gave a wide berth.

After falling from grace, Lorry was one of those people. Hermione was unpredictable at best, a trait Evan saw in her father often. A fact he would never mention, he knew that meant certain death.

But after the peace had been broken, without either side actually doing anything as mundane as talking about it, or shaking hands, Lorry noticed something was different.

Before he was promised peace either by Lorry leaving him alone, or Hermione sending him to the hospital wing. Now he couldn't, as he felt torn between his promise to the lads, Lorry, and Hermione.

She was innocent at first, but she soon moved very close to him, cornering him when he was alone.

He resisted at first, putting obstacles between them, making sure at least one of the others were there at the same time to run interference. He put confundus charms on her, set up ploys to keep her away.

In the end, Lorry become too much for him, and he sat down next to Hermione.

Hermione didn't notice at first, struggling for once over her homework. She had been taught a lot about Grindelwald as a child, but it was extremely different to what Binn's taught them.

Her father had tried to manipulate history to fit his own objectives. Hermione was equal parts infuriated with her dad, disappointed with herself and frustrated that she had so much studying to do. Even the history books seemed to disagree at some points.

She wanted to tear out her own hair in frustration.

Evan had watched her with trepidation, noticing her agitated state.

One minute went by, nothing happened.

two,

three,

four,

_five._

Was she going to curse him?

If so, why hadn't she done so already?

Did she want to torture him?

10 minutes.

His shoulders relaxed a bit, and he started breathing more regularly. His heartbeat decreased, and he stopped fidgeting.

20 minutes.

His posture relaxed, he leaned back into the chair, studying Hermione more intently. She looked very focused on whatever it was she was doing. Her fingers were slightly smudged from ink. Her hair was even more messy than usual, and as he observed her running her fingers through it, he understood why.

30 minutes.

She slammed a book closed, muttering to herself, and dragging inky fingers over her face. She had smudges all over her face, he just hadn't noticed before. He had jumped slightly when she slammed the book, freezing as he waited for her anger to wash over him.

Nothing had happened, and he was curious. What had her in such a state?

**The Muggle Second World War and Grindelwald.**

Why would that infuriate her so?

He wasn't about to ask though.

45 minutes

Not long after he relaxed completely. The time for him being cursed had long since passed. Since he hadn't brought any books or homework, he just leaned back and started daydreaming.

They were both lost in their own little world. Hours later Hermione had still not noticed him sitting right next to her. It wasn't until the librarian came over and kicked them out that Hermione looked up from what she was doing.

"Rosier? When did you get here?"

"Uh." He worried about her temper, but so far so good right? "I've been here for hours."

"Oh." she blinked and started collecting her books. Then she looked up at him and gave him a quick tired smile. "alright."

It took him a second before he followed her up to her dorms. He put his hands in his pockets, looking down at the floor, Hermione walking in front of him. They didn't speak all the way up to the tower, but before she left him, she turned around and regarded him.

"see you."

And with that, Evans problems were solved.

* * *

Lorry was pretty pissed.

For so long, Hermione and Evan's relationship meant he was pushed to the side, towards her.

Then something changed.

She had heard the rumours of course. Every little rumour that circulated Hogwarts eventually made it's way to her. She was a source of information, she knew everything about everyone. It was part of the reason she was attracted to Evan, there was almost no curious rumors surrounding him. Except for the ones involving all of Hermione's bodyguards and Hermione herself. And they usually didn't stray much from what they always were. Lorry of course knew better than anyone what went on between the 6 of them.

Then an interesting rumor finally emerged from the shadows. They were all in the hospital wing the day after Halloween. None of them had any serious injuries, but all of them were kept in bed that day.

And Hermione's dad had visited the school. Apparently Dumbledore had paid the hospital wing a visit too while Hermione's dad had been there.

There were many speculations about what had happened to land them in the hospital wing in the first place. And even more regarding Hermione's dad and Dumbledore. The latter was a rumor whispered in the Slytherin dorms.

Something about Hermione's dad made all the upper classes nervous. They refused to talk about it or speculate, and would loudly express their disdain for others conversing or gossiping about anything regarding him.

They would barely speak his name.

Following that rumor, Hermione had stopped hexing the boys, throwing even more wood on the fire. She had started being cordial to them even, and stopped trying to evade them.

And Lorry had gotten so close to Evan, because he could only use Hermione as so much of a buffer.

Now all of that was ruined because Hermione hadn't bothered hexing him. She just let him sit there, it was almost the same as when Lorry had forced them to spend time together. It had started becoming a regular occurrence even!

Lorry decided the best course of action, was joining them.

It had taken a lot of manipulation of Emily, and apologizing to Hermione. But finally, she sat right there with them.

She took great pride in the reaction Evan had when she casually sat down right in front of him. He looked like he was a mouse trapped in a cage.

She had him right where she wanted him.


	23. Ravenclaw Tendencies

**I just joined a RP'ing forum set in the Marauder Era. It is open if anybody wants to join, I have two original characters in the forum, and of course I couldn't resist the temptation of RP'ing Evan and Benjy. Both of which are slightly different than in this fic. [Remove spaces] www . fanfiction . forum / Of - Mischief - and - Marauding - Marauders - Era - RPG - AU / 186243 / or find it linked in my profile along with a link to my Twitter.**

**Thanks to all my lovely followers, and everyone that has favorited this fic. **

**A special thanks to my reviewers; AliceEnchanted, purple breeze, angelofdestiny16, ljoan and hollowg1rl! (and a guest reviewer)**

**Seems like all of you hate Lorry, to my immense amusement. Your reviews feed my muse, resulting in this being my second longest chapter to date! (The longest being Samhain)**

**Xx**

* * *

**Ravenclaw Tendencies**

* * *

How was she supposed to finish this essay?

All the books were just confusing, some told the same story her father had told. They were found in the 'Restricted Section' of course, but did that mean there was no truth to it?

When she read books from the regular part of the library, they seemed to collaborate the same things, but they glossed over the details. So how was she supposed to know what Grindelwald was about? It seemed like statements told in different voice. And every voice had an agenda.

What did Grindelwald want truly? Did he really do it all for the greater good?

That was what her father had said, and it was what the books said Grindelwald believed. But the truth seemed too complex to be that straightforward. Was there not more to the story than a crazy man hell bent on ridding the world of evil?

How did it all tie into the muggle war? The one they so brazenly called "The Second World War."

The one thing she so desperately wanted to find out about was the truth. Was there anything that could tell you muggleborns were lesser than other wizards? She had been brought up hearing stories about it.

Her father had a silver tongue, and listening to his tales for so many years had taught her that his truth was what everyone entering their house would collaborate.

But then he had told her a lot of things about House-Elves that Noddy proved wrong every single day. It was Noddy that had unknowingly taught Hermione that her father could be wrong. A discovery that had shocked her, his words had been the entire basis of her world. Everyone supported what he said.

Books might not have, but he easily glossed over that. Somehow he managed to do it convincingly enough, but without her able to remember his exact words.

She wanted to set all the books in front of her one fire. They said the same as her dad, "Kill the Mudbloods." Between the lines she could see the true meaning behind the author's words. _Remember, the rest of the world believes Grindelwald was wrong, so you have to say that too._

He was wrong, wasn't he? Why did he hate Mudbloods and Muggles?

She remembered Lily Evans, the Muggleborn she had been so briefly friends with. She had been smart, good at spells and a very nice person.

If her father was supposed to be the representation of all Purebloods, and they were supposed to be the light in wizarding society. Why did he torture, kill and manipulate so many?

She felt suffocated, by the books she had loved for so long, her solace, her safe Haven. They were towering over her, trying to tear her apart, betraying her.

In a move unlike her, she pushed the books over, some falling open, others falling to the floor. All of them making a mess and a ruckus.

She didn't care, she needed to get out.

She saw the librarian coming towards her, easily avoided as she ducked out of the library. Leaving her guard dog, she couldn't remember which one it was at the moment, to make excuses and clean up her mess.

Was she becoming her father?

The thought upset her even more, and she started running in earnest now, through the hallways, past other students that were surprised by her behaviour.

She ran and ran and ran, until her lungs burned, her muscles ached and her feet couldn't keep going.

She collapsed, crying and clutching the ground. Looking around she realized she had made it outside, the sun was low in the sky, the lake glittering as it caught the last of the sun's light. A breeze blew against her cheek, and she felt her tear streaked cheeks freeze.

How had she lost control so suddenly? How long had she been out there? Her breathing calmed a little, but she was not ready to go back in and try to figure a way out of this mess. What was she to do, there was no one to turn to that would understand. No one who could explain to her how crazy the wizarding world was.

She felt alone, and for once she truly was.

Collecting herself a little, she walked over to the nearest tree, and slumped down. Her back was resting on it's trunk, and she wished life could be this simple. That she could sit and only care about the sun going down.

Pretending that was her entire world, she bent her legs and pulled them up to her chest. She leaned her head on her knees and just sat there, observing the sun as it disappeared behind the trees and the Scottish mountains, as the lake glittered and the sky turned red.

It was quiet as darkness started to descend.

"Didn't figure you for a romantic" His voice surrounded her, and she started, surprised by the sudden sound.

She looked around and found Benjy, broom slung over his shoulder, hair windswept but still incredibly handsome. His green eyes showed humor as he regarded her from afar.

"I'm not." She said softly, unsure if she was really seeing him. The only friend she had ever made, someone she had been so rude to earlier. Why was he talking to her now? What had changed?

"So what brings Hermione Riddle out on the grounds alone, looking at the sunset?" He smiled at her, so open and comforting. He started walking closer to her, and sat down next to her. She tried to casually brush away the tears still running down her face.

"Stuff." She eloquently said, looking away from him, trying to hide the traces of how upset she had been. How upset she still was, even if his presence did lighten the burden a little.

But he caught it, and he touched her jaw lightly, turning her towards him. Her brown teary eyes met his green concerned ones. "What happened?"

She felt overwhelmed by the emotions in his eyes, she had never had anyone but Noddy act concerned towards her. Part of her was afraid it was all an act, that he would remember what she had said weeks ago, and walk away again. "Why do you care?" she sniffed.

He sighed and removed his hand when she didn't try to look away from him again. "I told you, we're friends."

"I thought you didn't want me as a friend after-" he cut her off.

"We had a fight, nothing that can't be fixed."

She looked at him wide eyed, trying to see through his act. But the more she looked, the more she started to believe it wasn't an act, this was just the way Benjy was. Could this wonderful handsome man actually care about her?

He smiled at her slightly, and she felt her heart skip a beat. His expressions were always so honest, his heart on his sleeve.

"Really?"

"Miss the opportunity to be friends with the daughter of the Dark Lord? Who would pass up the opportunity?" he grinned at her, but she started crying in earnest now. His words echoed through her mind painfully, like he had actually confirmed her suspicion all along.

"Hey I was joking." he put his hand on her shoulder and leaned towards her, trying to catch her yes again. "You know I don't care who your father is. Right?" She looked up at him, and there was that honesty again. That painful honesty that she found so hard to believe.

"You don't?" she started wiping her tears again.

"Of course not."

She threw herself in his arms, surprising both of them. Hermione was not one to initiate physical contact, and Benjy had not anticipated her hug. Nonetheless, he brought his hands around her, and hugged her closer, trying to bring her comfort. He felt very awkward with the whole thing, he wasn't used to dealing with crying girls.

"Thank you." she said after a while.

"For not caring about your father?" she blushed, hiding it in his robes. Then she drew herself away from him.

"For everything." she answered simply.

He grinned at her again, pleased that it had all worked out well enough. "No to ruin your good mood, but why were you sad?"

She sighed, looking away from him again. "It's silly."

He nudged her lightly "Try me."

"I can't figure out how to write a History of Magic Essay about Grindelwald."

"That is silly."

"Benjy!" she exclaimed, kind of hurt that he didn't care enough to lie and tell her it wasn't silly.

"Very Ravenclaw of you." that comment made her smile though.

"Really?" she replied happily.

He rolled his eyes at that. "yeah." Then he straightened up slightly. "I know I'm no Ravenclaw, but do you want my help?"

"That would be perfect, thank you."

Then he stood up "Let's get going, no use freezing to death out here."

She mock sighed "I suppose not." she started raising herself up, not really managing to gather her legs underneath her properly. Then suddenly, she saw Benjy's outstretched hand, silently offering her help to get up.

She looked from the hand up to his face, once more questioning his motives. Again she found nothing but honesty in his look, and she slowly took his hand. He helped her up, and they moved to the castle in peaceful quiet, Hermione fiddling with her robes, Benjy with his broom over his shoulder.

When they were in the entrance hall he turned to her "It's getting late, do you want to do this tonight? Or should we wait until tomorrow?" The next day was a saturday, and Hermione felt her heart jump slightly at the thought of spending the entire day with him.

"Tomorrow." she murmured, blushing.

They continued walking up to their separate dorms, only parting ways at the changing stairwells.

"Goodnight Hermione."

"Night Benjy." He left her then, and for a moment she just stood there, looking after him. She couldn't help how happy she felt knowing that stupid essay had brought Benjy back to her.

* * *

The next day she started the day with a smile. Then she remembered her guards, she would have to figure out a way for them to be ok with her spending time with Benjy.

At Breakfast she looked over to the Gryffindor table. Benjy hadn't come down yet. Looking over at the Slytherin table she noticed that none of her protectors had either.

It wasn't until she was halfway through Breakfast that Benjy showed up.

Instead of taking his usual spot at the Gryffindor table, he sat down next to her, grabbing a muffin. Repeating his actions of that morning so long ago. She smiled shyly at him. "Morning."

He smiled back "Morning."

When they both had finished breakfast, only Regulus had showed up at the Slytherin table. He looked extremely nervous when he saw Hermione talking to Benjy so casually. When Hermione and Benjy pushed their plates away and started to leave the Great Hall she motioned for him to follow them.

Hermione figured that of all of them, Regulus was the least likely to say anything offensive, or try and separate them. The boy wasn't going to be asked twice and quickly grabbed his sandwich before he followed them.

The day was nice, easy, quiet. At times Hermione sat just enjoying Benjy's company, and at others she was waiting for disaster to strike. When he went down to the kitchens to grab them some Lunch, Regulus sat down next to her.

"What are you doing Hermione?" he whispered harshly.

"Homework, thought that was obvious."

"But with _him_?" Regulus raised an eyebrow at her.

Hermione decided she needed to blackmail the kid, with Slytherin's that was always the best solution. "be quiet about this and I'll continue being as pleasant as I have been since Halloween."

He seemed to contemplate that, the boys had all agreed that they should do whatever it took to continue having Hermione this nice. Hogwarts had almost been pleasant in the last few weeks. On the other hand, Voldemort would be furious if he found out Hermione had been hanging out with Blood traitors.

"And if I don't?"

Hermione gave him a bone chilling smile, one she had probably inherited from her dad. "Or I'll stop being pleasant, tell the boys it was your fault, and tell my dad you _let me_ be with Benjy." she raised an eyebrow, waiting for his counter. Regulus was very trapped, he knew that rumors that he might have let Benjy and Hermione hang out was way better than Hermione telling Voldemort directly that Regulus had allowed such a thing.

"Fine." he spat, and Hermione smiled.

Regulus retreated to the shadows, and continued to watch over the pair as they did their homework. He could at least be thankful that it was nothing more than that. Through their interactions he gathered that Hermione must like the boy, but he regarded her as a friend, a very platonic friend.

By the end of the day, Hermione had managed to get a decent perspective on the sick mind of Grindelwald. And by extension, her father. She hadn't realized how backwards and severely fucked up the wizarding world was.

Benjy had been great in explaining everything to her, he already knew about how crooked her world view was, and that she genuinely wanted to change it for the better. That it was her father's fault, and the environment she grew up in, and that she knew it was all wrong.

People can't change all on their own, and Benjy was just the person to help her become a better person. She admired him for it.

For the next few weeks they developed a way of being able to be friends. She would subtly let him know when it was *safe* to be around her, when it was Regulus who was supposed to watch her. They would then spend time talking by the lake, doing homework if she knew Emily was busy, or she would come down to the Quidditch field to watch him fly his broom.

He continued to be a good friend for her, even if they got very little time together. He had many friends, and was usually surrounded by them. For some reason he made time for her, and she was happy. He continued to tease her about being such a Ravenclaw, and trying to convince her to try flying. She would ask about his life and learn more about the world than the narrow view she got from her Manor, and push him to do more homework.

She noticed that Evan had taken to sitting next to her when he was supposed to watch her, and she did her homework. He was a silent companion, and for some reason she preferred having him next to her than watching from afar.

After a while, Lorry approached her. She was surprised, but her regained friendship with Benjy had her more trusting than ever. Even though she knew Lorry must have her own reasons for joining them, she didn't care. It wasn't until she noticed Evan freeze up when Lorry joined their little table in the corner that she figured out what that agenda was.

Honestly, she was surprised the girl was still on that.

Evan's discomfort eased a little over the weeks up to the Christmas Holiday, when he realized Lorry would not do anything worse than stare at him over the table. If Hermione moved through the stacks to find books however, Evan was at her mercy.

He had become Hermione's shadow more than ever now. She sent him annoyed looks, but he looked pleadingly back at her, and motioned towards Lorry.

Hermione eventually figured she could use it to get the boys off her case with Benjy once and for all. They were standing in the stacks towards the back of the library, next to the restricted section. Once again Evan begged her to do something about Lorry.

"Fine I'll protect you from her."

"You will?" she could hear the disbelief in his voice, and she didn't blame him. She did have an agenda after all.

"Yes." he breathed out in relief when she said that. "But only if you make sure the boys back off when it comes to Benjy."

"Who's Benjy?" he scrunched his face up, Hermione pretended not to notice as she browsed the shelves for the book she wanted on Herbology.

"Benjamin Fenwick." she casually said, opening up a book of interest, pretending to be very interested in it, while at the same time trying to be nonchalant about the name.

"The bloodtraitor?!" Evan shouted, and was immediately shushed by the nearest narrow eyed Ravenclaw, while Hermione was still holding the book up, pretending to read.

"That's the one." She closed the book, figuring it wasn't relevant for the essay she was writing, and moved down to open another one, Evan close by.

"No deal." he hissed in her ear, and she snapped the new book shut and glared at him.

"Fine." For a moment they stood like that, staring each other down. Then she put the book back on the shelf, Evan curiously looking at it's title **Magical Roses by the River, **before he followed her.

She had disappeared, her stuff gone from the table, leaving only Lorry. Emily had disappeared too, and now it was only him and his stalker.

The second last week of Hogwarts before the holiday, Hermione kept leaving him with her. He knew Lorry would return to her parents, while he was stuck at Hogwarts with Hermione. But with only one week to go, he gave up after Hermione had left him with Lorry, again. And Lorry had managed to corner him and assault him in the middle of the library.

He confronted her that night, following her up to her dormitory, he caught up with her in an empty corridor not far from her common room.

"That was cruel." he called out after her.

Hermione turned around and looked at Evan, seeing his frown she felt slightly guilty about her actions. "Worse than when I hex you?"

"Way worse."

It was her turn to frown "Guess I'm losing my touch if Lorry has me beat."

"Guess so." Evan wasn't sure where she was going with that.

Hermione mock sighed "I'll just have to start practicing again." she pulled her wand, and pointed it between his brows.

He gulped, and backed up slightly. "Let's not be hasty."

She raised an eyebrow at him, and he continued "can you just please stop leaving me with Lorry."

"Will you agree to my terms?"

"What terms?"

She scoffed and looked annoyed at him "Benjy?"

"You're still on that?"

"Yes!"

He grumbled, if he agreed to that, he would most likely end up in trouble with her father. "You know Voldemort is not the one with a wand pointed at your face right now." Hermione said, reading his thoughts correctly.

"He could kill me."

"Maybe." Hermione agreed "But not if you're smart about it."

He started thinking about ways of taking her down and reversing the situation. Remembering their past he didn't like his odds however.

Hermione flicked her wand, and his wand flew out between his fingers where his hand had started moving to grab it. Evan gave her a look relaying how much he wanted to kill her in that moment. "I could always just say you're already doing it."

She put his wand in her pocket, and pulled out a letter from the same pocket.

"Dear dad, I have been spending a lot of time with Benjamin Fenwick lately. I wasn't sure it was alright, but Evan Rosier assured me it's fine." Hermione said mockingly, and Evan's eyes widened.

"You wouldn't."

"I would."

"You'd sign my death warrant?" he asked, and Hermione had to fight with herself to stop from showing him she could never do that. Recently she had developed some respect for him, and no matter what her father tried to make her do, she could never willingly permanently hurt someone.

Instead of answering, knowing she wouldn't be able to voice that she would indeed do something like that, she just raised an eyebrow at him.

Their discussions always ended up like this, eyes locked on each other, battling internally for dominance.

"Fine." Evan finally said, and Hermione smirked at him.

"We have a deal." She lowered her wand, and started to move away from him. He caught her arm, stopping her from running away. She looked down to his arm on her, and then up to his sharp blue eyes.

"Not so quick, you have to agree to my terms as well."

"What?"

"Make Lorry back off-"

"Fine." She cut him off, but he didn't let go. He smirked at her and pulled her closer, making her uncomfortable.

"I'm not done." She pulled her arm away from his, and he smirked even more, knowing he could affect her as well. "You have to get her to back off for good."

She gaped at him "That's impossible!"

He shrugged "Then I won't get to boys off your back when it comes to Benjy." he moved closer to her again, and she backed up until she had the wall against her back. "In fact, I'll make sure Regulus won't let you hang out any more either." she scowled at him "oh yes, I know about that too."

She pushed him away from him and moved away. "Fine!" she spat over her shoulder.

"Hermione."

"Yes!" she snapped and stopped, but she didn't turn.

"My wand."

She pulled it out of her pocket and threw it on the floor, leaving a very pleased looking Evan Rosier in the dark corridor.


	24. Christmas

Did you think this story was abandoned?

I know, I am sorry it has taken me this long to update. I will remind you, this story will never be abandoned unless I die o.0 (wow, I went dark.) I have just started with the Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition and it is taking up a lot of my time. Therefore, updates will be more infrequent. It's just that this story is my baby, I absolutely adore it and want it to be perfect. So when I found out that the 49.000 words I had written for it were riddled with SPaG I had no motivation to fix them all up. I wanted that fixed before I updated, but then I figured with the way I keep postponing that I would never update. And thus, we arrive at my decision to update!

Somehow, this chapter gives me points in the Diagon Alley II forum! I am now a Mod there, you should check it out!

Multi-Chapter:

Plot and Character development

#7 Include a scene that humanizes your antagonist in this chapter

#11 Show your protagonist in a situation they are deeply uncomfortable with in this chapter

I love you all, thanks to my reviewers; AliceEnchanted, sxcond, Lexicon63738, and Guests (one of which had some great ideas, thank you, 'Prank tom riddle', I will include some of that in a later chapter hopefully.)

Xx

* * *

The last week of classes before everyone else left for the holiday was pretty normal. Besides a few significant looks from Evan any time Lorry came close, nothing really happened.

Seeing that Evan was the only one of her Bodyguards staying the rest of the lads had decided to give him the week off. It made Hermione's job of keeping Lorry away a lot easier. Besides a little interference between classes at times, she didn't have to do a thing!

At last, the day had arrived when everyone departed.

Hermione was standing next to Evan, but she still kept a distance between them — he was just out of arm's reach. They both looked at their friends shuffling around saying their goodbyes and making sure they had everything they needed while they avoided looking at each other.

When Lorry had finished giving Hermione a hug, she immediately sought out Evan who was now discussing something in hushed whispers with the rest of the guys. Hermione almost had to separate Lorry's shoulder from its socket, trying to hold her away from the poor guy.

"Lorry," she warned.

"He's so dreamy."

Hermione sighed "Can't you just leave the poor guy alone?"

"Why would I?"

"Favor to me?" Hermione tried, even though it was most likely for naught.

Lorry pursed her lips but didn't say anything more as she left for the train with Emily. The girls walked hand in hand, whispering and giggling, neither glanced backwards to wave at her. The arm she had raised to wave them off fell limply to the side.

As the others left, Hermione was staring at them, wondering what it felt like to have somebody to go home to, somebody that would welcome them with open arms. Parents that smiled as they saw their kids stepping off onto the platform, Siblings that were jealous and longed to hear all about their adventures at Hogwarts.

She more felt, than saw Evan step up behind her and to the side. She wondered if he was thinking the same thing.

Outside Benjy was saying his last goodbyes to his friends, the sun was shining on him, painting a picture of innocence and bliss. He looked happy like the world was a joyous place to be loved. It made her chest ache for the same level of happiness.

"Hermione."

She looked back at Evan when he spoke to her, and she immediately thought about the difference between the two. There he was in the darkness, shadows dancing over his face the same way the light danced over Benjy's outside.

His eyes, though, those sparkling blue eyes, they stood out in all of it. Understanding what she was thinking, his face didn't offer sympathy, but instead it offered solace.

Not understanding what emotion welled up in her chest at the thought of not standing so close to the abyss alone, she looked away and responded, "I'll be in the library." Before she whisked off without looking at either boy, not that Benjy noticed. Evan however, sighed and followed her, thinking it was going to be a long Christmas.

She had been in there for three days straight, and Evan was sick of waiting outside.

"You haven't stepped foot outside in three days." Hermione almost fell off the chair, she was so surprised to hear another voice after being in silence for so long.

"How did you get inside?!"

Evan rolled his eyes and moved to sit in one of the comfy chairs looking out the windows onto the grounds. "Please, it's not exactly difficult. Do Ravenclaws believe they are the only ones smart at this school?"

Hermione put the book away and narrowed her eyes at him. "We don't believe, we know."

"Guess I proved you wrong then."

"Exception that proves the rule."

Evan shrugged and looked out the window to Hermione's ire. How could she so easily get a reaction from everyone but him?

"Why are you here?"

"You need to eat."

"I don't—" she started, but she was interrupted when her stomach grumbled. Evan raised an eyebrow at her.

She scoffed. "Didn't know you cared."

Instead of answering, he continued giving her that look, until she got uncomfortable and looked away.

"Fine." She put the book away and followed Evan down to the kitchens. They walked in silence until they reached the entrance, and Evan tickled the pear in the painting to get into the kitchen. She sat down and started to nibble on some of the food the elves brought her when Evan decided to break the comfortable — on her side at least — silence.

"Don't tell the boys I got in so easily."

"Why?"

"I'd be sent up to get you all the time."

She looked at him over her cup of tea.

"Mutually beneficial," he mentioned in a casual way, and she could see his point. If the boys knew, Evan would be sent up every time they felt like she was avoiding them. The benefit of having a tower away from them would no longer be the case. Even if it was just him that could sneak away to her secluded tower.

"What's the price?"

Evan smiled, happy that she knew better now than to take things from a Slytherin without inspecting what was handed to her.

"You stay out of the tower when I tell you too."

"No deal."

He raised an eyebrow at her.

"Like I am going to subject myself to the whims of a teenage boy." She scoffed.

"What whims do you think I have?" he asked.

"No idea, but I'm sure I don't want to find out."

"Half of the time then."

"No."

"Rest of the year."

Her eyes glinted dangerously. "Fine."

…

"Ah, Miss Riddle, how nice of you to join us."

Hermione looked up from her book and stopped walking. Instead of 5 tables — one for each house and a head table for the teachers — there was all of a sudden only one. She looked to the Headmaster before she glanced at Benjy who was busy with his girlfriend, and then Evan.

He looked extremely uncomfortable in the presence of so many Gryffindors. Five Gryffs had stayed, and four Puffs. From Ravenclaw and Slytherin, only her and Evan remained. Besides them, you had the Headmaster, Professor McGonagall, Groundskeeper Hagrid and the librarian.

What a sad bunch they all made.

Evan looked at the vacant spot beside him, and then back to her, inviting her to sit. Or maybe she should think he was begging her; for she would be his only comrade in all of this.

Opening her mouth to respond to the Headmaster, she looked at him and found a stupid amiable smile. So, she opted for not responding to that. What could one say to a twinkling fool like him?

She realized she couldn't escape Christmas dinner like she had hoped, and closed the book with a thud that spoke of finality. Somehow she managed to get her feet moving again, and moved to the Slytherin boy. She never noticed the relieved look on Evan's face as she took the space next to him.

"Now that we are all accounted for. I have just a few words to say; Twinkle, Snow, Yule, and Mistletoe."

Hermione had lowered her head, uncomfortable with the cozy setting, and peaked at Evan. They shared a look and a laugh at the headmaster's expense, silently of course, as he was close by.

When the food came Evan started passing her food. She tried to pass but he responded by slapping a big piece of rib on her plate and raised an eyebrow at her. She knew he would start arguing with her if she tried to get out of eating it, and everyone else at the table would be on his side — so she took her fork and knife, and cut a tiny piece of the rib and ate it.

The Hufflepuffs all talked immediately, their friendly nature kicking in, and soon the Gryffindors joined in to talk loudly with everyone, and the teachers all seemed to be in high spirits. The only odd ones out where Evan and Hermione. It was the first time either of them had experienced a meal like that, where everyone was laughing and talking — celebrating.

"Miss Riddle, pass the potatoes?" Hermione looked at the puff in surprise, and he just smiled at her. She could have sworn the same boy had scoffed at her a week ago. Looking at Evan was no good, he seemed as confused as her.

Benjy laughed. "This is where you pass the potatoes, Hermione."

Still apprehensive, she took her good time in doing so, and then the headmaster chuckled at her. Both she and Evan looked at the man in surprise and confusion.

"I think you will find there is nothing wrong with the potatoes, Miss Riddle."

"No, I— uh… Of course— I'll-" She finished handing the Puff the potatoes and settled back down What was happening? Why were they all being so nice? They seemed not to want anything to do with her before then, so what had changed now. Was it Christmas?

She remembered every event back at the manor and every stilted conversation she was expected to have. You would have thought there was plenty, but for most of the time, Hermione spent the night in her room, while Noddy brought her food. Sometimes the door had been locked or warded so she couldn't 'interrupt' the guests.

Last Christmas, she had spent the night in her dorm, expecting the same, even though she had been at Hogwarts. She had expected very little conversation, at most a few words about the weather.

But, the only awkward people in this setting were her and Evan, everyone else was at ease.

"So, Evan, kissed any girls under the mistletoe yet?" Benjy asked over the table. When Hermione looked up at Benjy, he threw her a cheeky wink.

"Uh- No." Evan had always been one of few words, and practically none of them were uttered to Benjy. The Gryffindor seemed to hate Evan as well, especially if she were to judge by the way Evan responded to the situation.

"Anyone you want to be kissing?"

"No."

"Not even a lovely little Ravenclaw?" Benjy teased. Hermione was still trying to figure out what he was getting at, so she missed the interested gleam in Dumbledore's eyes.

"No." Evan answered in his 'Slytherin tone' as Hermione had dubbed it. That tone that showed no emotion, not even the lack of one.

"What about you, Hermione?"

"I'm not interested in girls." She quipped, and Evan couldn't help but laugh. They shared a look again, how stupid was this situation, really?

Benjy laughed too and kissed the cheek of his girlfriend. "No, I meant any boys?"

"No." She figured Evan's approach was a sound one.

He gave her a lopsided smile and stuffed some food in his mouth before he continued. "Anyone you _want _to be kissing?"

_You,_ she thought instantly and blushed scarlet.

"There is!" Benjy said triumphantly.

"No," she said meekly, not fooling anybody.

Benjy just winked at her and let it be, something Hermione was quite thankful for. When Evan raised an eyebrow at her, she took her second bite of something, to show him she was completely unable to answer. She could see him hiding a smirk, his eyes glinted, and he went back to his food.

The rest of the meal was very pleasant to Hermione's surprise. She got along with the Puffs and the Gryffs, Evan actually talked a little bit, but mostly with the teachers so it didn't really count. At the end of the meal, Hermione was sad to be leaving.

Benjy had his arm slung around his girlfriend and whispered in her ear. Hermione tried to catch him and see if they could maybe spend some time together, but of course, he had his girl. Flavor of the month was a pretty and tall brunette.

"Merry Christmas." Hermione stood alone in the entrance hall and whispered off after him.

"Merry Christmas." She turned to see Evan behind her, hands in his pockets making a peculiar picture. He seemed to have an internal battle with himself, of what she couldn't tell. Taking one final look up the stairs after Benjy and the laughing Gryffs, she went over to Evan.

She motioned to the great hall. "That was..."

"Strange," Evan answered and smiled at her, a genuine smile that made her relax. She would still tense when around him at times, like the memory of summer hadn't left completely. Then again, she could see Evan tense at times too, because of his history with her.

"Do you…" He breathed out, hands in his pockets, eyes to the floor again.

"What?" She scrunched her brows, he was never nervous around her, not like this at least.

"The Slytherin common room is empty."

"Yeah so?"

He seemed to decide on something and looked up into her eyes — blue and brown in that battle again. "Wanna go check it out?"

She wanted to smile, this was the first time she had ever been invited to something like this. Not out of necessity or because someone was told to do it. Keeping her cool, and biting her lip to stop her smile she responded with a, "Sure."

For once Evan led the way and Hermione walked behind him through the maze of the dungeons.

The common room was not what she expected. Green from the lake, the giant squid swimming by in just that moment. Flickering lights from a fire in the corner, expensive chairs, and sofas spread around the room.

It almost seemed nice.

"What do you think?" Evan asked.

"Not what I expected," she answered while hiding a smile.

He motioned for her to sit on the couch while he stood around nervously. It looked like he didn't know what to do with himself.

Having thought of something to do, Hermione asked, "Do you have 'Tales of Beedle the Bard'?"

"Yeah, but don't tell my dad."

"Why?" Hermione asked confused that a bunch of fairytales could be of harm.

"Fountain of Fair Fortune," he answered.

"The Muggle?"

"Yeah."

"I actually like that one," Hermione said.

"Should you be telling me that?"

"Your dad would react worse than mine."

Instead of answering that - the burden of absent fathers hanging in the silence that cut between them - Evan changed the subject again. "I love that on the quest for the fair fortune for love, she finds love was right next to her through the journey."

"I didn't take you for a romantic."

Evan just shrugged in response. "What is your favorite story?"

"The Tale of three brothers."

"Power, Love, and Life," Evan summarized. "Not the story I would have guessed."

"My dad used to read it to me," Hermione mumbled.

The silence stretched between them again.

"Could you get it? I read it every Christmas Eve."

"I thought you would be busy with parties," Evan joked. This time, Hermione didn't care about responding. Instead, she sat down on the couch he had offered before. Evan got the hint and walked off to his dorm to get it.

They sat next to each other, reading the story together while they sat by the flames. Hermione grew tired after a while and Evan offered to read the rest out loud.

In response, Hermione handed him the book, curled up next to him and relaxed while she watched the flames. Evan's voice slowly lulled her to sleep, the last thing she thought was:

_One died for power, one died for love, and one greeted death as an old friend._


End file.
